


Broken Togetherness: A Tale of Tethered Seas

by bardsandbeetles



Category: Original Work
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M, Mystery, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-03-11
Packaged: 2021-03-13 18:14:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 13
Words: 25,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29406057
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bardsandbeetles/pseuds/bardsandbeetles
Summary: After Delia and her mother, Kentucky born and bred Olivia Harkston, are forced to give up their home and everything they know because of the economy, and move to a brand new place - Delia discovers a secret that has to do with the land around the property of Ellsworth - or should we say, the water.  There's something not quite right about the big old Victorian house they bought, and no matter how hard she tries to stay away from the water it sings to her and sings to her, and tempts her near.  What is the secret of the Clarke-Shawe Manor, and what does it have to do with the inky gray ocean that hugs the shore?  It may be more than what she's ready for.(my first story on here, so be gentle! Thank you! <3)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 2





	1. Siren's Lullaby

The ocean was calling to her again.

She didn’t have to get out of her small cramped attic bedroom to sense it.

It was more than just the sound of the salty brine filled waves lapping against the pebbled shore.

It was more than the soft inviting whispers of the creamy off white foam gently kissing and hugging the shoreline, the gleam of the jade glass green and flecks of indigo and azure under the pallid moonlight. In her mind she could picture it carefully the way the waves would carry tiny bits of amber wood and verdant lush seaweed and algae. 

It would twist and turn within the water’s hold like a tiny acrobat, the fragile passenger in a very very large world. 

She wondered if she trailed her fingers along the waters’ edge would it sing to her in the way only it knew how? Would the pull of her fingers make the fragments of the sea gravitate to her?

She also could smell the windowsills freshly painted, and she knew if she opened her eyes she would see how perfectly her palm print would rest against the oak that lay beneath. The beams that conjoined the window were strong and solid, rectangular in their hold.

The house was Victorian in nature. Dollhouse like, when Delia and her mother first saw it, their eyes had both lit up in utter amazement. It looked like it had been frosted with sugar the way the angled woodwork swept around the house with incredible detail and sill, notable for the time period which the real estate agent had estimated to be about 1860-1890 and drenched in gorgeous Stick-Eastlake style with a pitched roof and huge double hung windows, which honestly were Cordelia’s favorite part. 

There had been water damage to one of the lower rooms, but the price-point made it worth it. They were sold on it before the petite blonde even opened her mouth to try and convince them. Of course they couldn’t tell her that. They had to play the game, act as if they were merely interested, before getting a good bargain. 

That had been one of the hardest things to do, hiding their excitement. 

Rebekah, their agent, was incredibly peppy and zippy. She reminded Delia of a small bird with her movements the way she constantly zoomed about, flitting here and there and everywhere her small fuzz of poodle like perm hair bobbing in the breeze, the blonde contrasting sharply against the crimson of her jacket and dress and blood red nails. 

They found out fast however, that though their Victorian dream house was beautiful it was certainly very drafty, especially right by the water. Of course most people would call them lucky. Maine was known for it’s quaint little houses along the Atlantic ocean Ellsworth especially so. They loved their quirky charming town even though it took an adjustment to live there from Kentucky. 

Kentucky was quite a bit warmer and Olivia Harkston took a bit longer to get used to it than her fair haired daughter, Cordelia. She was in every way a modern southern bell – sweet, hospitable, and very creative but Gunthrie (population 1435) where she had been born and raised her entire life – was far slower than Ellsworth. 

People there had lineage all the way back to the 1800’s (or so they claimed). Delia had spent her mornings going to farmer’s markets and 4Hclub events, digging her hands into bins of fresh peaches and chatting with Mr. Hue about the local storm that ‘might-be-a-comin’, and helping her mother to run the local library when she got old enough to stack books and organize them properly. Her afternoons were spent outside in the sunshine among the daisies, common rush, woolgrass and golden asters. She’d come back home smelling of fresh earth and rose verbena, bits of the light purple flower tucked into her hair and her pockets and anywhere else that seemed feasible on the small, golden haired child. 

She had an incredible amount of freedom to go where she wanted and when during her childhood, when she looked back on it. Time spent on neighborhood porches falling asleep next to eagle eyed little old ladies whose skin looked like a combination of finest gossamer and tissue paper, and grumpy basset hounds who lay in the sun too long and couldn’t be bothered to move from their sweaty stoop spots. 

The only thing her mother had any anxiety about at all for the small honey-tressed girl was swimming.

She had this unreasonably strong fear of her drowning, and she wouldn’t let her anywhere near water. 

Delia could remember as far back as preschool when her teacher had taken the entire class of them to a pool and Olivia had nearly had a heart attack over it. She absolutely refused to let Delia get in or around it, and it was the one thing she absolutely would not back down on. 

It wasn’t until she was far older (at least high school) that she found out about her Aunt Amelia and the infamous ‘incident’ that had rocketed their entire town to it’s core. 

Amelia and Olivia had been closer than two peas in a pod. They went everywhere together, and they were born only a year apart, so closer to being twins than just sisters. The two of them could always be seen – Olivia with her burnt fire tresses and Amelia with her cinnamon bronze locks – arm in arm, skipping to fairs and farms and everything else in between. 

Their childhood was very similar to Delia’s own: always out in the sunshine and dancing among livestock, weaving flowers and humming of fairies. Smelling of the wild flora and fauna and soaking up the outside world as much as possible, unafraid of making mud pies and singing in the LITERAL rain. 

They also did a fair amount of fishing with Delia’s grandfather, Hiram, especially on the little boat they had outback.

And this is where it all went wrong. 

It had been a clear Spring day when Amelia had sneaked out, and the pale gray morning still had not subsided. She’d begged their father to let them go on the boat by themselves and he’d refused.

Amelia was still mad about that, and damned determined to do it herself. She’d tried to get Olivia to help her, but Olivia had refused...but she promised not to tell, sister’s bond and all. 

And it was a disaster.

The ramifications of her not telling would live with her the rest of her life.  
Amelia had managed to get the little boat out. That wasn’t surprising. They’d lived their whole lives around water.

But she’d slipped when she was trying to get the top down, fallen in the water and hit her head and died within a few minutes – right in front of Olivia, who had rushed out after feeling anxious over letting her do this. 

Years later when Olivia had Cordelia, she promised herself never to let the same thing happen twice.

Hiram said the best way to make sure it didn’t happen was to get Cordelia comfortable with water, and to be a strong swimmer, but Olivia wouldn’t hear of it. Even her own mother couldn’t convince her. 

Seeing Amelia die and not being strong enough to pull her out had traumatized the librarian, and she made very sure unless her daughter was showering and hygiene, she had nothing to do with water ever again.

And of course, that was hard on Delia, who had far too much of her Aunt’s temperament. She was well behaved for the most part, but had that certain mischievousness about her in her chestnut and russet eyes that her own mother did not seem to have. She loved the water, and the fact that she was not allowed in it was all the more tempting. 

Perhaps then, that was the strangest thing about her mother’s decision to move away from Gunthrie to Ellsworth Maine of all places. Right by the water! 

But then, because of the recent outbreak in the nation of disease, economic times had been very hard. Many public places had been closed down – including the darling little library where Olivia had spent most of her career. 

Ellsworth was expanding their library if anything, and needed more help than they could get. It was cold, it was near the ocean, and it was far away from everything Olivia and Cordelia had ever known, and yet when the job offer came in she bundled up their small red Honda, sold their little house she’d been holding onto (ever since her parents Hiram and Macy had passed on) and they took the long and egregious, twenty hour bumpy road trip to the chilly town in hopes for a better life. 

And now they were here, and they’d been here for a solid four months. The Fall hadn’t been terrible, but they’d arrived in November, so maybe they’d been tricked into believing it wouldn’t be that bad. Once they got the house and settled in, winter passed slowly. Achingly slowly, as if bone cold fingers were dragging pitifully across the ground.

There was no central heating in the home, they’d bought it as is, and the water damage in the living room was noticeable – even after an extensive job of rose colored paint to cover the staining up. They’d invested in trundle loads of blankets, thank goodness, and as luck would have it their neighbor from two houses down was more than a little friendly, and willing to loan them some real wool blankets until they could get to the store and purchase their own. The ones they’d brought with them just weren’t warm enough, especially with a house like theirs.

Finally however, March made her way into the sleepy town and woke everything up and thawed everything out. It was still damp and chilly and the wind was still biting, but the snow was reluctantly receding to make way for warmer, lemon yellow sunshine filled days. The flowers poked their heads up out of the ground, tender shoots of green with a vibrant array of orange, pink, red and yellow blossoms, their buttercup radiant in the sun. 

Delia got used to the sounds of ice singing as it cracked, as the waves stretched and flexed their muscles along the shoreline by their house. And she longed to scramble over the side of the wall that blocked her from that very ocean and to see it’s off gray and cerulean colors once more. She’d seen it once as they drove along the winding roads, and she smelled it very often when she was on her back porch.

She rolled over in her wicker bed. It was too small for her, but they couldn’t afford to be picky when it came to furniture. When they’d gotten here, they made due with what little resources they had to furnish the house and settle in, and that meant sometimes they went for price-point rather than comfort level. She could feel the itchy, scratchy comforter grazing her thighs and it made her grunt. 

The ocean was calling to her again.

For once she wished it would not. 

She supposed she should be grateful for the move. Grateful for this big beautiful (albeit chilly) house and the fact that they both found jobs to help support themselves.

The library had welcomed both of them, but Delia had found – as much as she loved libraries – she needed her own space to bloom and grow.

A flower shop two miles down the road was looking for help. It had started out part time, but they liked her enough they’d offered her a full time position, especially with the owner Dotty getting on in the years. 

The flower shop was wide and boxy and the color of tulips with broad, mint trim. It’s quirky coloring had become something of a local legend, really. Dotty had started it back in 1965 with her cousin Darlene. They’d called it The Bloomerang Bin, and people loved it. When Darlene passed on, Dotty was really having trouble up keeping the place so Delia – who also had a ‘D’ sounding name which Dotty loved – was the perfect person to help her. It all just fit. 

She contented herself among the gardenias, the junipers and the blushing violets, the smell of florals always clinging to her skin, even when she washed it off with her soap. She supposed in some ways things had come full circle: she’d loved playing in the wild flowers as a child, and now she got to work with them every day. 

And yet somehow when she got home and solemnly started dinner (or peeped in the crock pot on nights she knew her mother would be late) she couldn’t help but feel like this once charming place had a bit of a mausoleum like feeling to it.

It was big and hulking and rather empty.

Even with the furniture in it, it just seemed strangely tomb like.

“Don’t be silly, Delia.” She muttered to herself now, and curled deeper into the bed, desperate for warmth.  
Yet, she couldn’t shake the feeling somehow, between the sound of the waves and the sound of the wind and the shadows skittering upon the walls of the house, there was something chilly about their new home and it wasn’t just because of a lack of central heating.

There was something else at bay here.

She just didn’t know what.

~*~


	2. KINnection

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> As much as Delia loves her new home and is settling in nicely, she's trying desperately to piece together more than a career in Ellsworth. It's been her and her mother for ages, and growing up she's had to deal with that. Now that she's gaining confidence and independence though, she's more curious about the OTHER half of her DNA. It might cause her more trouble than it's worth though.

She often thought about her father.

Honestly it was hard to get a straight answer out of her mother, about the man who gave Cordelia the other half of her DNA.

Delia wasn’t sure if it was in an attempt to keep his identity a secret at first to prevent her from seeking him out or if the woman she called ‘mom’ merely didn’t know who who the father was, and was too embarrassed to say so.

He was never in the picture, and both grandparents had been rather tight lipped about the people her mother had gone out with before. 

Perhaps it was because she’d had a bad experience?

It was never spoken on either way. Since Delia’s earliest memory it was just her and her mother against the world, and that was that.

Now though the move seemed to stir up all kinds of things within her. 

Fragments of memories scattered about her like sharp slivers of glass.

She didn’t like that about herself, that she couldn’t seem to keep the past just the past and let it be. Something gnawed at her now. When she slept in that bed and heard the water sing, she felt at times almost like she’d heard it before, and what’s more there were dreams that correlated with it. 

That was silly, she knew, but it was almost overwhelming emotional feeling, like seeing a familiar face but not quite being able to place them.

A flash of a sail boat paint burning red in the sun, the whites of the sails unfurling, the smell of the sea tingling in her nose and someone pressing their lips to her cheek and calling her ‘mo leanbh’. A tangle of long hair the color of cinnamon and crushed sienna and golden undertones similar to her own, but nothing more than that for her to go on. 

Sometimes she dreamed of a scent, of clean soap and timber and the tiniest bit of rosewood and jasmine.

Sometimes she woke up thinking she heard footsteps – masculine footsteps falling heavily against the stairs – coming up the main hallway.

But there was always nothing, and the few times she mentioned it to her mother Olivia had waved it off as nothing more than an old house settling.

Cordelia had started taking melatonin at night to help her sleep. She’s never had to do that before, but the confusion of the dreams was really starting to unnerve her and effect her every day life. 

She tried not to take it often, she didn’t want it to be habit forming, but recently it had been more frequent she’d taken it. 

Tonight though she stared at the deep amber bottle with the bright peppy neon lavender label and she put it down. 

It was time for answers, one way or another, even if she didn’t like them.

Her mom always went up a little after she did. Usually when the glow of the apricot colored light wavered in the hallway and faded into cool inkiness and the smell of warm chamomile tea drifted past her bedroom door Delia knew she could venture out, just a little perhaps but she could. 

She moved soundlessly, curving her feet so not to hit the creaky step a quarter of the way down.

There were two of them she had to get around but somehow she managed.

Somehow.

Once she heard the house settling (which only helped her cause) she sneaked out to the back patio and managed to crawl the tall stony wall that separated her from that ocean. She needed to be near it, she couldn’t explain why. She’d almost dropped her iPad a couple of times in the process, (thank god for backpacks) and she’d scraped her hand on the way over. It stung red and raw and tender, and the blonde was pretty sure she’d twisted and ankle however it had been worth it. 

Now she stood and surveyed the beach beyond, and the great gray pooling mass that sparkled in the moonlight. Somehow she got a gut feeling the water and her father and maybe even that big old house had a connection, she just wasn’t sure how.

The libraries were closed by now but even if they’d been open that was the last place she’d want to go because she was pretty sure her mom wouldn’t appreciate her trying to look up into on her dad. She wasn’t a child, far from it in fact. (Twenty three, to be exact.) But she knew somehow if the brunette caught wind of her daughter’s antics, she would shut it down forever.

Digging into the cranberry backpack she pulled out the smooth sleek iPad and fired it up. She was close enough she still had WiFi. 

Her heart was yammering in her throat, but she pulled out the second item, and made her way to ProjectProgenitors.com.*

A photograph. Blurry. From her mother’s things, when they’d unpacked. She’d stolen it on instinct. It was a rather hazy shot of a man’s shoe, and a basset hound puppy sat in it with a big red bow, and on the back the writing said March 17, 1997: a year before her birthday.

Something about that picture brought nothing and everything to her. It was incredibly frustrating. She felt as though she was so impossibly close to pulling this all together, and yet she was still missing something. 

She looked at the website, and then she looked at the photo and the date.

It was dark, only the glow of the iPad was there to help her.

Yet somehow, on the very back of the photo, in smudged handwriting, there was something she hadn’t seen before: a location.

“What?”

She squinted to make sure she wasn’t seeing things, but no there it was in faded pencil: Capri, Italy.

She saw her mother’s shoe in the background too and knew exactly what kind they were. She still had them – lime green heels with a stripe of hot pink under the bottom. She’d BEEN in this picture, with whoever was giving her the dog. 

Delia typed in the date into the website, and it took some time for it to think.

The way ProjectProgenitors.com worked you put in what info you knew, and they could help track the locations of people who might be related to you, based on what you said. 

So she typed in the info she knew, any snippets she remembered from childhood (no matter how strange) and pressed the annoyingly chipper orange rectangular ‘find your fam’ button.

Nothing could be more terrifying than watching that arrow spin and spin around and around like the early day modem hookups of the 90’s computers.

Finally though, the arrow stopped spinning and her breath hitched in her throat.

She had a name.

No face, no age, no real resolution, but Lewis Malcolm Campbell had been in Capri, Italy around the time Delia had herself had been conceived. Her mother had been staying at La Bella Incrinata for a work conference according to the website and 10 minutes down the road Lewis Malcolm Campbell had been staying L’unico squalo pinna. And he was a sailor. 

She didn’t know how to feel.

Her stomach was flip-flopping.   
Finally she had something, something real and tangible. 

How long had she been out here? She saw the sky starting to turn lavender and pink in some areas, and her fingertips were chilly on the screen. But perhaps they were shaking too, in surprise.

She’d have go in soon but there was a very good chance she’d just found her father.

Now however, a new question rose up: would he want to be found? Would he want anything to do with her? That question being unanswered was almost more terrifying and hallowing than her looking for him in the first place. 

She felt nauseous. 

She threw her things in her backpack and managed to scramble up and over the wall once more. 

One of the neighbor’s dogs (a big Belgian Malinois named Lula who might have had a fluffy name but ABSOLUTELY took no shit) could smell her and barked aggressively in the dark. 

“Shit Lula really? Now of all times?” Cordelia grumbled. Her ankle was swollen. She definitely had twisted it. 

She winced but managed to make it back inside without a hitch...only to be greeted by a robed silhouette in the kitchen.

Arms crossed, hair swept to the side and exhaustion present on her mother’s face, Olivia was the picture of a furious – albeit concerned – parent. She looked Delia up and down and murmured, “I trust you have an explanation?” How did she manage to give her a very Scarlett O'Hara/Vivien Leigh face with the arched eyebrows and all, when SHE was the one hiding things? 

“You know Mama,” her throat was dry but somehow she managed to whisper it out, “I was going to ask you the same question.”

“Were you, doll baby?” The smooth Southern drawl came out effortlessly, even as there were lines on her face and a wisp of silver in her hair.

“Yes.” Delia huffed, and her mother pulled out the blonde wood kitchen chairs.

“Well then, we’d best be getting to it.” Olivia murmured. She was absolutely livid and Delia knew it, but this had been a long time coming. “Before you give me a heart attack quicker than a hog munching down corn on the Fourth of July. Good gracious girl, tell me how and why you scaled that wall. You could’a killed yourself?”

“You saw me?” She answered.

“Not right away but I woke up when something didn’t feel right. Mother’s intuition and all.” The butterscotch eyes met hers. “Now talk before I do, because if it was up to me well…” She pursed her lips. ‘You already know you’d have a sore ass for a week.” 

“You haven’t spanked me since I was eight.”

“Gimme good reason and so help me I will take those wooden spoons right back out of the kitchen drawer and remind you...now why were you out there?” She answered and Delia heaved a sigh.

“This.” She pulled out the photograph, and faded as it was, her mother saw it and her face went white.

Immediately.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *ProjectProgenitors.com is a completely fictional website, but I didn't feel like using the typical ancestry websites like Ancestry.com or23andme.com. For the sake of this story I needed something a bit more advanced, to track movements. I wanted to clarify, in case people were worried such a site exists.


	3. Tides Are A Turning

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We shift over to the viewpoints of something much darker. A predator in the water. Read for more <3

[Italy – Capri]

As much as she was looking for her family, there was another family out there of an entirely different sort who happened to be looking for her too, but their intentions were no where near as pure as hers were.

The waters surrounding the Sirenum scopuli were so black that when the moon rose into the sky, instead of the lunar light reflecting on the waves it was swallowed by the tar colored waters. The waves rocked themselves to sleep in slow tranquil movements, gently brushing the usually rocky islands with tepid frequency. They did not have the strength for storms tonight or so it seemed – but then one never knew. Just as easily as they were lulled into slumber, could Mother Nature raise them again to frothy rage, their icy fingertips clawing desperately at the jagged terra firma, destruction in their aquamarine blood. So far though, they had not been whipped up into mercenary like recompense, but moved with glib slightness against the raven depths.

But if the moon were gentle and the waters so, there was a distinct different in between nature and the creature that swam towards the solemn land mass. Within the Sirenum scopuli (known to some as Capri, Italy) there was a particularly rough and rocky section hollowed out away from the rest of the world that had a unique combination of water and rocks – perfect for raising young. The sirens were called many names, and there were at least three different distinctions/breeds between Clans or Families. 

One was the celestial under Zeus' domain or so the legends went, the other was generative under Poisiden's rule and the third (and generally regarded as the most morbid of all) the purificatory or cathartic and under the rule of Hades': King of the Underworld.

But whether these legends had truth or not it mattered little, in actuality, or at least it mattered little to the sleek shark-like predator that easily cut through the waters like a pearl handled dagger and headed towards the craggy location with precise speed.

Delphine could hear them before she could see them (if one were to give her a gender at all) but that wasn't unusual. They'd molted their winter feathers – a dull and flat brown – and changed into a brilliant rainbow color, much like a scarlet macaw might and as Winter turned to Spring, and Spring to Summer, they were increasingly excitable. Strangely enough if they lifted their wings, it wasn't scarlet on the underside of it, but the same muted brown as the top would be in the winter. She saw a few of them fluttering back and forth between the hollowed out space with water and the rocks, and she knew instantly then someone had had a brood of chicks.  
She did wonder how they managed that one, considering everything that was going on in the world, but that really wasn't what she was here for. She could report the information of course, back to her own matriarchal pod leader, but she had her own agenda that had little to do with chicks at all.

Of course they didn't know that. Much like the seagulls she so likened them to (loud, irritating and thoroughly raucous – honestly what was their appeal again?) they were constantly keeping an eye out for predators, especially when it came to their chicks and she didn't really blame them. To be fair, like many of the other animals that lived in the water, the Atargatisans1 loved an easy kill and chicks were very easy to snag out of their nest. All one had to do was rile up the Sirens and distract them, and dinner was practically served.

But again (for once) that wasn't what she was here for.

The sleek torso-ed swimmer made her way up to the nesting Sirens, and then she breached the water.

As soon as she did, she felt herself transferring from creature to 'woman' (at least up top) and she growled. She was very fond of herself in Atargatisan form – she certainly felt more comfortable that way, but communication was a necessary evil, and as advanced as the Atargatisans1 were they had no real need for speech. 

Whistles and clicks more like the dolphins from which she took her name was their language, and when one was really in danger the Matriarch spoke through 'the bond,' which was more of an intuitive feeling passed from pod member to pod member, rather than words.

Words were harsh. Unnecessary. Cumbersome. She could speak if she really had to but it wasn't enjoyable.

But the sirens were half woman half bird and this was required, so she found herself pushing her head up past the dark murky waters and eying them while she changed.

They knew she was in pain. It didn't change their excitement level. 

Her gills smoothed into the side of her neck. Her pod did have hair-like outgrowths like the Mirapinna esau, on their 'head' – but her hair cells which were used to sense water pressure and movement, water temperature and even chemical gradients rather than for ridiculous aesthetic reasons. But when she rose above the water they changed when oxygen hit them, and became even more hairlike. Could one call her a brunette? She'd heard the humans toss the word around before, and though she hated to align herself with anything having to do with the clod hopping overgrown primates, she supposed that was the closest comparison in accuracy to 'color' that described her 'hair' when above water.

Vision was the next thing to go. In water their hearing was heightened and they didn't need sight as much as they did their hearing, although they did have a double slit pupil, and their eyes were developed enough that they could take in and adjust to the changing light. Above the water she felt lens and cornea correct for the bend of light caused by coming out of the water, and with it (agonizingly) her laterally placed eyes (which gave her much needed independent vision) conglomerated together as her face shifted into that of a human woman's, instead of a Atargatisan predator. 

Delphine had heard stories of Atargatisans who were hearing impaired, and it was very difficult for them. They relied heavily on echolocation for food, when they weren't drowning humans (much like their siren cousins ironically enough) and so hearing was imperative. Without it, they were lost – and she did not know how ones who had difficulty hearing managed.

“ La bestia sta arrivando. Il demone dal profondo! Custodisci i giovani! Proteggili dal serpente d'acqua!”2

Italian. 

Now that was an interesting turn of events. She'd lived long enough to hear the Sirens speak primarily Greek – when did they shift over to Italian? 

If she had the mental mind frame to chuckle, she would have, but seeing she was on a bit of a mission from Ianthe (their Matriarch) she had very little time for that. Ianthe, like many Matriarchs and pod leaders before her, did not forgive insolence and incapability. When an Atargatisan was tasked with a duty, there were no questions to be asked: it was to be done, on the Mother's Honor, that was that. If they failed, they were cut off from pod life and most likely died.

“Cosa vuoi? Non abbiamo niente per te!” What do you want? We have nothing for you! She heard one of them squawk at her like an actual parrot.

Her mind must have been working overtime to translate it fast, but she was thankful. 

“Interessante che tu abbia dimenticato la lingua delle tue madri, sirena. Vergognoso. Cosa direbbero, sentendoti parlare così?” 3

She was mocking them and she knew it. It would come back to bite her in a literal or figurative sense, she was sure, but the Atargatisan couldn't help but smile – but again, that would be seen as a warning, rather than a friendly gesture. Their kind after all, didn't smile. Not for the same purposes as humans. 

There was a fluttering of feathers, a rasping sound, and a chattering of vocals. They collectively were torn between knowing they had to protect their young, and also addressing her. The Atargatisans and Sirens – however distantly related – did not usually interact pleasantly together after all. Like any other animal, it was predator prey behavior, and it was on both ends. 

Just as they had lost chicks to the Atargatisans, the Atargatisans had lost calves to the sharp talon fraught bird-women. They often fancied themselves closer to humans than the Atargatisans: a deadly mistake, in the aquatic one's mind.

Another figure emerged now, this one with feathers cloud silver like an African Gray Parrot: an elder, for certain. 

“Delphine.” No more Italian now, the words rolled swiftly out of the Elder's mouth. “I remember when you were a podling, nothing more than a calf. My you have grown. To what to we owe the pleasure of this visit?” Calanthe was careful, she held a respectful tone and a respectful distance from the water, which was wise to do. 

There were Seven Seas, and seven districts then of Atargatisans, much like the Seven Seas. Each variety of Atargatisan was similar, but uniquely equipped for their body of water. While the brunette herself did not have octopus like suckers on her tail, she knew for a fact that there most certainly were those who did have octopus like behavior, as well as a tail, and others who were closer aligned to the sting ray division. Get too close, and the risk was there that one might pull you in and/or shock you. 

Calanthe knew that, and her wisdom showed in her smooth voice and calm demeanor. She had earned her gray wings, like much was clear. The others, seeing her behavior, settled themselves amongst the rocky island. They were still weary of Delphine, with good measure, but they sat themselves down and peeked at the Elder and the aquamarine predator, obviously very curious, even in their fear. 

“I have come bearing news from Ianthe.”

“News you say? That is interesting. It has been a long long time since my Kin and yours shared anything, let alone news.” Surprise lit her features for a moment, the hazel eyes gleaming at her. “Not since Konstantina's time.”

“May her memory serve peace.” The Atargatisan muttered then, as was custom, and the Siren hummed. 

The others rolled their eyes and muttered but Calanthe, wispy haired and argent curl-head like Medusa herself, nodded. “Yes, may her memory serve...peace.” She answered articulately, and cocked her head at Delphine. “What is this news your Matriarch brings?”

“There has been a shift in the tides – ”

“Why should we care about a shift in the tides? We are creatures of land, or have you forgotten?” Another suddenly spoke up, assertion and aggression in her voice. “We have had little to do with you, since your Konstanina's mistake.” The siren, young by the color of her feathers, spat.  
Immediately Delphine hissed back at her, fangs bared and irritation present in her voice, a growl set in her vocals. 

“Patience, Dionysia. Is that any way to treat our guest?” Calanthe soothed, ever the monarch, and the youngling frowned. 

“Why is she our guest? She is our enemy!”

“In the great food chain yes, biologically speaking she may be. But she has come here in the spirit of peace, invoking her ancestors' name. We must listen. It would be rude not to hear her out. It may benefit us greatly, fledgling.”

“Mmmph.” The redhead seemed to grunt, but settled against the rocks again. 

“Now, I apologize for the interruption, aquatican.” The Elder murmured. “Do go on.”

“From one Mother, to another: Ianthe speaks. She says that the tides have changed, and there is tension in the water. There is always bloodshed, it is the way of the world, but lately she has seen the predators in our water going after others, and not because they are hungry. Nature drives us, it is our god. This you know, even if my Kin and yours are separated. We are ruled by the same force. Now the ancient senses something else is in the waters, an energy of chaos that has not been there before.”

“I see.” The siren shook her head. “And what has this to do with us?”

“There was a time once, when we were one. Ianthe seeks alliance. ”

“That was a very long time ago. Usually alliances are out of the question.” Calanthe answered. “If the situation is that dire, why did she not come herself?”

“You know very well how it is to rule a Kin. Your Siren look to you as a Queen, they call you The Mother. We call ours the same, well in our own way.” A quirk of the mouth. “For the same reason she would not see you, you will not see her. If I set it up between you two, you would not meet. You would think it a trap.”

“Clever merbrat.” The bird in her ruffled her feathers. “Alright then, do tell: why does she seek alliance?”

“That which was locked away for the safety of all, is at risk of being opened again.”  
The distress was almost immediate.

“That is impossible.” Usually calm, Calanthe's nose flared in clear irritation and fear and she huffed, and Delphine nodded. She felt her own skin chill at the thought.

“We thought the same. Years and years ago, before you and I were ever in existence, but in the days of the First Pod-Mother, and after the disuniting of our families – yours and mine – you know they locked away Poseidon. Born a Gemini, he is ruled by two sides: darkness and light. Now he has found a way to be free, and not only that…” She paused.

“What is it, Atargatisan?” 

“He has created a new bloodline, with the humans.”

Calanthe frowned deeply then. “How do you know this is true?”

“We have many scouts, as you do. One of them saw the child. She is gawky and uncomely and nothing to look at, but the birthmark on her hand speaks. She is of Poseidon line.”

“Then she must be ended, a monstrosity.” Calanthe answered, her irritation growing.

“It is not that simple. It seems there are those around her, even if she doesn’t realize it, set to protect her.” Delphine answered, bobbing gently in the water. 

“Of course he would insure that. Bastard.” The siren spat. “Very well. This sounds as though we will indeed have to team up to take care of this mess. Tell your Pod-Mother then this warrants a meeting after all. For we cannot have the new blood line accidentally calling the Kraken upon us and wiping us all out.” 

“Are you sure? Is there not another way?” Dionysia interceded but the Elder shook her head. 

“No my fledgling, this must be dealt with swiftly, before all of our lives end.”

Delphine chewed the inside of her cheek for a moment, and then nodded. “Very well. I will let Ianthe know.” And she silently slipped under the inky water as soon as she had come, her own mind racing on what was to happen to them all if Poseidon really was free, and intent on seeking revenge on them for locking him away.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here are all the translations and notes you will need for this chapter:
> 
> Atargatisans1 = Humans called them mermaids/mermen, but the apex predators of the Seven Seas did not take kindly to that name. Instead they tended to name themselves after Atargatis, the goddess from northern Syrian heritage who had once been in charge of fertility, protection and well being, but who turned herself into what humans would call a 'mermaid' when supposedly she killed her human lover by accident. Again, the Atargatisans don't follow that version of the story, and often consider her transformation an evolution or an ascension from her body into what they are now. 
> 
> “ La bestia sta arrivando. Il demone dal profondo! Custodisci i giovani! Proteggili dal serpente d'acqua!”2 = The beast is coming. The demon from the depths! Guard the young! Protect them from the water serpent!
> 
> “Interessante che tu abbia dimenticato la lingua delle tue madri, sirena. Vergognoso. Cosa direbbero, sentendoti parlare così?” 3 = "Interesting that you have forgotten the language of your Mothers, siren. Shameful. What would they say, hearing you speak this way?"


	4. Machinations of a Grand Design

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Delphine and the Atargatisans have a chat on what is to be done about Poseidon's offspring. Plotting and planning (as well as a history/mythology lesson into the Atargatisans and the Sirens) ahead.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In this chapter though there is no violence, there is a brief mentioning of potential cannibalism because Atargatisans/mermaids eat people, like any shark or other predator does. I will adjust the warnings to protect people who many not want to read that. Also there is threatened violence for poor Delia, though nothing happens in this chapter to her. There is also a lot of mythological reference in here for the Atargatisans and the Sirens, but I promise it is important to the back bone of the story. Stay with me!

Like a gymnastic ribbon dancer Delphine’s powerful tail rose and fell, rose and fell, cutting through the water sharply as she moved.

Finally, she felt so much better being in her element away from the air.

It was painful to her, like choking on glass.

It made her feel like she was claustrophobic, like she couldn’t function.

Under the waves though? That was a totally different story.

To her the wide expanse of the ocean was what the night sky was to humans.

It was vast and dark and inky and so completely boundless it swallowed one whole and freed them at the same time. 

She moved soundlessly, but was always listening and prepared for danger none the less.

It was an odd duality in that way, the water. Capable of beauty and freedom and clear of the dark stench of capitalism and yet…

...yet in another way just as dangerous if not more so. 

Here one need not worry about bankers, credits and loans.

Here it was literally life or death.

There was no fantasy here.

A shark could easily take her out as much as she could eat a fish on it’s way between the underwater flora and corals, tempted by the occasional sunshine. 

But of course mortals didn’t want to think that. 

Humans had such a limited view of what Atargatisans were. They had their flaws views thinking the predators were nothing more than a dream or an overactive imagination of exhausted horny sailors.

Well, maybe some of the stories came from seeing matinees but most of them actually were seeped in truth to a certain extent. The Greeks got it right closer than anyone. They warned about sirens (as well as sea monsters) and their ability to lure men to  
their deaths and the Atargatisans were very much the same. 

Predatory.

Deadly. 

Violent.

Of course the stories if anything helped their cause. If they were seen by a human they could either pretend to go along with the stories until they polished the human off (it wasn’t really cannibalism if it wasn’t human to human, right?) or they flipped their massive tail and acted as though they were nothing more than a dolphin or small whale – though the whale was less believable if one were honest.

It all depended on how close the human got, and what they saw. 

She was pulled from these thoughts as a large shadow passed over her, and she forced herself to go deeper – and swiftly. She wasn’t stupid like a human to try and find out what it was (though she had a sneaking suspicion it was a sperm whale). Whatever it was, it was big and fast and that was enough information for her. 

She was getting closer to the Atargatisans’ ‘home’ if one liked to call it that. 

Down she went, feeling the pressure increase. It didn’t bother her, but she definitely noticed it. 

It was impossible not to.

Italy was not well known for it’s coral reefs but it did have one. Well below the surface and the sunlight and hidden away right along the coast cooler deeper water it was made differently than the typical reef. It’s composition was almost castle like, stone like even. Entirely made of calcium and less attention seeking than a usual reef, it actually was safer for the Atargatisans that way. It was roughly two miles long and (adequately covering coast of the Adriatic Sea) sat on top or shall one say in front of a cave like structure.

If one were clever enough to get past the reefs and into the caves there would be an outstretching labyrinth of sea caverns and once one made it past that, they’d reach the Atargatisans home base. 

The inside was much larger than it seemed. There was a place to raise the young, a place to hold meetings, a place to eat. It was a massive water filled space but the insides of the cave could rival the Sistine Chapel if one really looked.

Brilliant natural hues of navy and green and purples melted into creamy pinky pearls and delicate orange. The entire top of the cave was filled with these almost iridescent colors and when the electric eels swam by (which the Atargatisans had an allyship with of sorts) to light up their spaces, the colors bled out into the water creating a rainbow effect.

She could see them now, their lithe bodies flashing to and fro after someone had leftovers floating about.

Honestly it was probably Eliana. She was known to leave crumbs, just to keep the eels happy. She treated them more like pets than any of the rest of them did. Pets were a human concept, the rest of them didn’t view the eels that way. Eliana was the youngest though, she still hadn’t made her first sea trip Up, and had some baby like notions like that.

Delphine whistled slightly in annoyance, Fallyn noticed immediately and made her way over, her gorgeous brilliant red tail sweeping about her like sails in the wind, reminiscent of a Siamese Fighting Fish the way the elegant fins swished around her. 

“What is it sister?” Fallyn asked through their bonded link, her hair-like outgrowths purple in hue and lock-like around her face. 

“I have accomplished what our Matriarch bid me to do.” Delphine nodded. “The Sirens’ Mother will give us Allyship in our cause regarding Poisiden’s monstrosity.”

A pause. “It is well you completed the task.” Affection was a rare thing in their pod, but Fallyn wrapped her tail with Delphine’s for a moment, showing happiness. “I am glad you did well.”

“So am I.” She’d been nervous frankly, when Ianthe their Pod-Mother tasked her with it. They all knew how and why the Sirens and the Atargatisans separated after all so many years ago, and how they could have a similar fate if they didn’t listen. The Sirens called it ‘ Konstantina's mistake,’ in reference to the fact that many years ago when the Sirens and the Atargatisans were one and Konstantina – with one act of defiance – split them forever because she had an accidental brood of children with Hylas, friend lover and companion to Hercules. 

Whether they wanted to or not, both Sirens and Atargatisans traced their lineage back to the same source: as daughters of Phorcys, who was a smaller Greek god of the sea who represented the dangers of the water and also some of them given title of daughters of Achelous. 

Up until this point sirens weren’t really named, but a blessing on a few was bestowed on a few, and they were named Parthenope, Thelxiepeia, Peisinoe, Aglaopheme, Ligeia and Leucosia and with these names they were officially recognized as the daughters of the river god Achelous.

Konstantina came from this line, and did Calliope their leader. When they initially took Hylas captive, as Sirens were prone to do, Konstantina begged Calliope – the Matriarch at the time – not to kill him until Phorcys and Achelous could get involved/preside over things. Calliope, their leader/matriarch, was a daughter of Thelxiepeia, and she was so furious by Konstantina's actions, she had her wings stripped and she cut her off from their pod to die. 

Demeter saw this action and had mercy on her, and spoke with Achelous. (She was still mad at the sirens, and had cursed them because of what happened with her daughter Persephone. She had given them wings in the first place to help them find Persephone when Hades first stole her. Demeter felt this was a good way to get back at the sirens by offering Konstantina kindness – it would piss off Calliope and Thelxiepeia, who wanted her to die.) 

Achelous then fashioned her a tail, and all her children from that point had tails as well, hence the birth of the 'mermaid.'

And hence, this is where the split happened, but it was the least complicated of their history really, when all things were considered. 

Throughout the years they lived in rather seclusion, till one of them (named Pelagia ) – dissatisfied with being unable to stay in the water, wanting to go on land (pulling a LITERAL 'little mermaid' move) engaged with a local fisherman's wife, who was actually a witch. Thais told her she could come on land, and she would give her something to make her human, but that once a month the spell or potion would demand she return to the water with a kill/sacrifice. 

Thais warned Pelagia if she did not go back to the water, and if anyone found out what she was, she would be turned into a Hippokampi. Hippokampi were fearsome, they were horses of the sea - Poseidon's chariot is pulled by (four) giant Hippokampi. Pelagia would therefore become a 'child of Keto,' who was a giant sea goddess of the dangers of the sea or more specifically, whales, large sharks, and sea monsters, and she herself would become hideous, if she did not comply with the rules.  
Regardless of what Thais warned, Pelagia wanted badly to become human, and drank the potion anyways. As one can imagine, this didn't turn out well. 

For starters, the transformation was excruciatingly painful, to go from mermaid to a woman. Once she learned their customs (she stayed with Thais and her husband, who taught her everything,) she began to explore, almost getting herself killed in the process when a group of thieves tried to rob and beat her on the way 'home.' This is where the trouble started: a man named Zenobios saved her. He was a friend of Thais' husband, Phiobos.

Phiobos thought it was good for Pelagia, to normalize her. It could not have turned out worse. At first everything went well, but then she fell pregnant (echoing the actions of Konstantina before her,) and as the pregnancy moved along, one day she could not go back to the sea – and the punishment was deadly. Immediately she became a Hippokampi and lived in Poseidon's realm. When she was there she begged him to help her baby.

Poseidon was not known for being kind, but in this instance he spared her child: under a condition, of course. He would return her child to the surface to live a normal happy, healthy life with her biological father, but only if Pelagia condemned her future bloodline so that every 100 years, one of their offspring would belong to the Ocean god in one capacity or another. 

It broke her heart to do it, but she felt she had no choice. She went along with it, and when the child was born it was delivered safely to their biological father, Zenobios.

These events happened around 12th-century B.C., around the time the Odyssey took place. 

Because Poseidon dared to help Pelagia when she was supposed to be cursed, Thais the witch sought out both the Sirens and the now Atargatisans and together they did the unthinkable: they combined their magic and locked him away. They tried to end the line of Pelagia but the once-mermaid/Atargatisan was clever and put a protection charm over her daughter so she and her line would never go into the sea again and therefore be safe, until Poseidon was freed again, and then their line would be destined to start anew. 

This was why it was so imperative his new line be destroyed. If somehow he had been freed (and Delphine did not know how) and mated with his destined human and the line was beginning again or had already advanced, everything they knew could be in danger.  
Fallyn removed her tail from the brunette and made a humming sound through her gills, stirring Delphine out of her thoughts. 

“Come with me to see our Matriarch?” She tipped her head and Fallyn nodded. “We have much to tell her.” And then as though she were still closely linked she shared with Fallyn through a serious of images what had happened with the sirens. 

They swam over then to where the Matriarch was curled into a relaxed position and used their hair-like outgrowths to make a fluting sound. Ianthe stirred and cracked an eye open.

“Little one.” Ianthe acknowledged her. “Give me your news.” She was still very beautiful in a sense but like a whale she had scars on her from where she’d had a run in with a boat in her youth and also like a whale she had barnacles on her long draping tail. 

And through the bond, Delphine began her long and winding story.

Ianthe’s face was neutral – perhaps that was the most terrifying thing about her. She let the youth tell her tale, brows crinkling only occasionally as her blood red hair growths swayed around her face like a drowned Botticelli angel. 

“You did well, Delphine.” She finally answered when all was told. “And we will most certainly speak more with our...cousins about this Allyship. We will need their help, regretfully. But there is one more thing we must do, besides engaging with our avian brethren.” A pause. “We contact the bulls.”

A shriek then, a chittering of noises and the rest of the Atargatisans were greatly unnerved.

“It is not mating season.” Udella answered softly. “Matriarch we trust your judgment but…”

“You know how the male bull Atargatisans get around us. There is a reason we live separately unless it is in regards to mating.” Maeve, another Atargatisan finished.

“I do know yes, and I would not ask for their help unless I thought it necessary. They are most fearsome and aggressive, but we must have one of their own come to shore to either kill the monstrosity while he is there or drown her, or if he cannot end her – if she is protected, he must bring her to us and we will do it, and smear her blood to relock in Poseidon with the help of the Sirens, so he cannot harm either of us.” Her eyes glinted dark charcoal. “You know this is true.”

Delphine knew it was true, yes. But it didn’t make acknowledging it any easier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Give me your feedback! <3


	5. Acquisitions and Acquaintances

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After some convincing, the Atargatisan bulls make their way into Ellsworth Harbor Park & Marina and the town itself. They meet some interesting and VERY unexpected people.

Ellsworth Harbor Park & Marina made it easy for the Atargatisan bull to make his way from the ocean right into where he needed to be. It was a long trip but he didn’t mind. Bulls made year round trips anyhow for migration and mating much like their whale cousins did...cousins – was that the right word?

It was a human term.

Atargatisans didn’t think of themselves as being related to anything else in the same way humans did. 

People were always trying to relate themselves to everything. They’d built their whole culture around it, from the gods they crafted to the stories they told to their (very much mistaken) belief that they were the top of the food chain. 

Everything came from their center and projected outwards in a selfish manner.

Atargatisans and may other sea creatures didn’t view the world that way at all. 

Perhaps it was the nature of things.

The aquatic creatures held no sentimental value to things the same way humans did. 

The mortals put animals in their stories all the time and gave them personification. They took the animals in and raised them as their own young, often going to far as to call them ‘baby’ or – nauseatingly enough – ‘furchild’.

Their concept of what was important also seemed to lack sense. Some of them were fighting to ‘save the environment’ but then killed trees to print the signs on to ‘raise awareness’ ABOUT the environment.

They were clumsy like children. 

Illogical.

Rehan did not frequent the surface often, he saw little need for it, but when he did he usually was either irritated or amused by the people he came across – depending on the day. 

Unlike the female Atargatisans, male aquaticans saw no real need to blood lust – when it came to humans anyways.

They constantly fought for dominance among each other, proving their strengths and merit of course, and it could get quite bloody – especially if one took up with a female another had had his eye on, but killing humans wasn’t a sport for them the way it was for the females. 

When it came to physical strength the bull Atargatisan was no sucker. He had several scars along his tale and upper back because of such fights, but he wore them proudly. He didn’t mind. The outcome of his scars were fruitful mating years and earning an upper spot in the bull pod. 

When he’d arrived at Ellsworth after he and some of the others in his pod had been convinced by the Matriarch (which had been rather tricky but ultimately beneficial to them, seeing as they would earn privileges in the next Spawning/mating calendar year) he’d looked for the two others who had decided to come along for this mission but they must have found found different entry points than the Marina. 

He’d meet up with them later. He wasn’t too concerned.

When he’d arrived it was under the cover of night which again was beneficial but he still had to be careful. 

He’d learned at an early age sailors were a different breed than most humans. They didn’t keep the same schedule. Their internal clocks were different, and somehow there was a certain wildness to them that made them feel the call of the sea almost similar to the bulls themselves. Almost. 

Thankfully when he rose up from the sea soaking wet (a rather painful experience much like the female aquaticans went through) and took the form of a 6’2 hulking ‘man’ whoever was there they didn’t bat an eyelash. Seeing rough ragged men was a thing around the harbor.

Finding clothes had been tricky though, and he was glad he hadn’t come across anyone when he walked out of the water. 

Nudity didn’t bother him. That wasn’t it. The bulls were used to the human concept of nudity, even if it didn’t resonate with them. They found it rather foolish (as did the females) because in water there was no use for clothing or style. Some of the females put adornments like shells or dyed their hair with natural resources but most of the time they did it to catch a bull’s attention and nothing more. 

Frivolous things like ‘fashion’ and styling didn’t really matter to predators like the sea creatures, after all. 

But for the sake of looking human he knew he had to find clothes rather fast. Blending in was key, if he was going to track down his prey after all. 

He’d made a bit of a bet with Keoni and Ophir that he could find and bait her into the ocean first. Ophir had made a barking sound that some might call a laugh, and had used the bond they all shared to make some remarks on how he was faster and bigger than the two of them. At this point Keoni had chided them and reminded them speed wasn’t necessarily the issue here but skill.

They’d all headed off in different directions, but would meet up and check in with each other at some point.

When he did come across someone, he’d overpowered them and took their clothing.

They didn’t fit perfectly. 

He was tall as a human man and physically strong – muscular. This man was shorter and squatter, but at least Rehan had something to wear temporarily, until he could figure out what his next move was. 

He didn’t have to wait long. 

Humans were notoriously curious beings and even more so, weak-hearted. 

He began to walk into town (a feat that he did not greatly enjoy) and almost immediately he was picked up by someone who assumed he was just a strangler and in need of assistance. 

He charmed the stranger quite easily and got as much information about them as possible. Predatory as he and the others may be, they understood the human psyche and how to work it to their advantage, as any psychopath might. 

The woman was small and slight and what humans might call a ‘granny type.’ She easily told him she had a bed and breakfast in town and offered him a night’s stay free of charge. Blue Goose Get-A-Way was beyond charming and delicate. It was a rectangular little house right near Union River Bay and offered him easy access to the town.

Maggie was a painter as well as the proud owner of Blue Goose Get-A-Way, and she remarked how she loved the view from her little bed and breakfast. Rehan obviously didn’t care much about the views, he had a target in mind, but for the sake of keeping her useful he made small talk as they drove in her busted little Camry. That had been a good choice – the more he talked with her the more he learned. Acadia National Park was a 30-minute drive away, on foot it would be farther of course, but it could be a good place for him and Keoni and Ophir to meet up without drawing a lot of detection.

The mental link wasn’t working above water, that was frustrating. 

Ah well, he would find a way to let them know one way or another. 

She gently remarked that she had a son about his size, inferring he could make use of his clothes until he got more settled. 

He thanked her (it seemed the correct thing to do) and she beamed. 

Sleeping as a human was a strange thing.

Normally Atargatisans didn’t dream. They slept and their bodies repaired of course, but there was no need for dreams. 

Usually they just slipped in and out of consciousness, carefully tucked away so not to leave themselves vulnerable to other sea inhabitants while they were sleeping. 

She brought him up to his room, an adorable little woodsy themed thing with baby foxes painted on the door and around the handle, and let him get ‘settled.’ 

He’d made sure to lock the door and push the chair up against it just in case and then he unmade the bed, stripped all the sheets and pillows off it, and slept. Somehow in his sleeping state the link was restored between him and Keoni and Ophir, because the next morning they showed up.  
Maggie called them a rag tag bunch and doted on them. Her son was off to college and she loved every visitor she got a chance to see (they had been rarer because of the virus) and that did make Rehan’s mouth curl into a smile just a bit: but not for reasons one might think.

The little lady was barely 5’2 and as light as a feather, the most grandmotherly thing one could imagine and surrounded by three hulking aquatic killers and she was happy. She buzzed about the kitchen and laid out of a full spread of jams, honey, thick butter and cream as well waffles and other breakfast delights. 

Rehan had shot a look at his mates – they were as bewildered and amused by her as he was, but they ate in silence, only raising a brow now and again. They could have hurt her but they did not: she was useful after all and besides that they had no real reason to. 

Well fed and much better clothed then they set into town.

She offered to drive them (because of course she did) but they staunchly refused. 

They split up almost immediately, promising each other they would either meet at the Park or the Blue Goose Get-A-Way, since their mental bond/link wouldn’t seem to operate if they weren’t asleep or in water. 

If they stuck together the three of them would have just caused unwanted attention in town. They were all tall and muscular, with striking features. Keoni was the smallest of them and the most wiry in build but even he towered at 6’0. 

It was better for tracking down the girl to move separately and then circle back around.

The temperature was cool, in the mid forties if that. Rehan was grateful to have the jacket. Usually the cooler temperatures wouldn’t have bothered him in the Atargatisan body – their internal temperature ran high and the thick layers of muscle they kept on them insulated them from the cold – but in a human body, even a very fit one he felt chilly. 

The sun was brightly shining though and the air smelled slightly like an odd combination of fruit that was just de-thawing on the frosted trees (March was still very chilly and snowy after all) seaweed and sea (which they were very familiar with) but also that strange underlying scent one got when they walked through a forest after it rained. 

There was a certain denseness in the air beyond the chill, mixed with the scent of earth and condensation. There were underlying scents of pine and dead leaves. That made sense: as winter receded it’s hold on Maine, the ground was fertilized by the decaying leaves and now that the snow was melting they were being revealed. 

The first day or so he spent it just observing the people and copying their mannerisms, getting it down right.

After all, he didn’t know if the child of Poseidon would know about her powers and prove difficult to overpower – 

– “Oh!”  
He’d been mindlessly ambling in one of the local grocery store (there were several to choose from but the Ellsworth Hannaford Supermarket and Pharmacy sign with the brightly colored painted fruit underneath seemed the least offensive to his senses) with his cart and he had ironically put several sea food items in there when he’d bumped into the blonde and spilled the bag of oranges she was precariously clutching. 

“I’m sorry.” He murmured in a soft bass of a croon and immediately helped her pick them up. She laughed, a kind of musical little murmur caught between her throat and her nose and shook her head. 

“No no it’s alright. I didn’t see you, I shouldn’t have been trying to balance produce and text at the same time.” She answered pleasantly.

This was a lie, and he knew it, but it was customary for humans to make excuses for each other, a politeness. 

It made no real sense to him, being who he was, but thankfully he had enough sense to mirror her pleasant interactions and carefully bend down to plop the oranges back into the bag.

“Are they badly bruised? Are you?” He answered and she flushed.

Attraction.

Was it that easy?

A kind word, a glance in the right direction, and he stirred her senses?

It amused him, but he hid that behind the cobalt hues. 

“I’m fine.” She laughed again, a warm happy sound. “Thank you.”

“Thank you for bumping into you?” He lifted and inky brow and she grinned. 

“I meant for helping me pick them back up.”

“Well it’s the least I could do.” He smiled back charmingly. The smile might have looked natural, his gait easy going and his shoulders relaxed but inwardly he felt the smile was just wrong. Awkward. He was animal in many ways and in their world smiling just wasn’t something that was done – unless someone was trying to be intimidating. 

Still for her sake, he bared his teeth and she returned the gesture. 

Primitive, he thought with an internal eye roll. 

She was appealing though. He wouldn’t have thought so in his natural form, but he found her pretty and attractive in this form to a certain extent. She was moderately tall for a woman and well build, blonde with wide facial features that were welcoming and honest, with honey hued eyes and a full mouth with a little button nose.   
He ran a hand through his dark hair and hummed slightly. He’d seen someone do that outside Buckles’ and Ben’s Shoe Store when the woman was flirting with the cashier as he helped her to her car. The action was easy to mimic, and the blonde now reacted to it. 

Another blush.

“Are you here for work?”

“You might say that.” He answered her as they walked. She seemed happy with this chance meeting. They were total strangers, but she was happy. It was most likely the fairy tales stuffed in her head as a child – most girls were taught about that special someone coming along to rescue them by the time they were 5 or 6. 

Another strange custom, he thought.

While the human girls were dreaming of a Prince on a white horse, the Atargatisan youth were learning hunting and fishing skills. To lure people in, and to be very quiet when danger came by, and if danger couldn’t be avoided, then to fight it off until the death. Their worlds were impossibly different. Human children were infantilized and pampered all through their lives. His people from the time they broke through their tough shell (for the aquamarine females laid eggs much like turtles did) were taught immediately to be harsh and fight for everything one needed or wanted. 

They chatted briefly as she shopped, or rather he should say she chatted and he listened.

She told him about the town, her life, where she was working. Even invited him up there.

He nodded as was customary, but he kept his eyes focused on what mattered, and that was trying to find Poseidon’s spawn of a being. 

He said a few things that made her laugh, and very soon they were both up at the cashier’s. Her in front, him in back.

She didn’t have enough cash, and asked if she could bring the items home and run back up to the store mid afternoon.

The cashier refused and told her to move along and not hold up the line. 

She was flushed and flustered, and something about that gnawed at him and brought out the predator in him. She smelled like lilacs and honeysuckles, having worked in a flower shop, but when she was flustered there was something that spoke to his primal senses, an underlying scent he couldn’t quite put his finger on.

He watched her porcelain skin burn pink as a rose in embarrassment, how the fluffy strands of her hair gleamed in the light.

And then he did something rare: he interceded. 

Usually he wouldn’t have. 

This was a brief, amusing interaction and he had no reason to step in.

Something about her though, from the sound of her light feminine voice to the sound of her squelching nervous little hum of a heart to the smell of her fear mixed with the florals - something made him act. 

He slipped his impossibly large hand over the cashier’s with quiet reserve. His eyes flickered from blue to gold for just a moment. 

“I’m sure this is something that can be worked out. There’s no reason to put her in the back of the line...Randall.” He looked to the man’s name tag, sliver and glinting in the light. 

He watched the man’s face go from frustrated to slack jawed, dullness reaching his mute, flat brown eyes.

They weren’t warm like hers, like carelessly spilled amber or wheat with caramel. They were slick and two-dimensional and boring. He was in his fifties, obviously doing this part time in retirement. 

The charm was working. 

“I...I…” He stammered at Rehan who smiled again, but this time his smile was carved against his face, his lips pulled back against his mouth. Menacing. His eyes flickered just the littlest bit.

“What’re you doing?” The girl inquired, obviously confused. 

“I’m rather good with people.” Rehan hummed again, that warm rich bass flooding her system and making her stomach flip flop. “I’m just trying to help.” 

She quieted and Randall muttered and excuse and let the girl – who couldn’t have been any older than 22 maybe – slide by without paying. Rehan flashed him a smile and once the girl started to walk ahead, he slid right through – without paying as well.

He had no interest in human money after all. 

He planned to go back to the Blue Goose Get-A-Way and reformulate his attack when the woman shook him out of his thoughts.

“Thanks again. It was...really cool to meet you. I’m Delia, by the way. What’s your name?” She tipped her head.

All this time.

All this time she’d never given her name, or asked for his. 

Amusing. 

He wouldn’t give her his real name. That was sacred to the sea. To tell someone outside of their pod was a grave offense. 

“Marcus.” He lied easily, the same he’d told Maggie before. Like Marcus Aurelius. A leader. A warrior. Unstoppable. 

“Marcus.” Her face bloomed like a flower in the sun, warming the apples of her cheeks. “I’m Delia. Cordelia.”

“Yes.” He chuckled. “You said that.”

“Well thank you again…” She answered him, not offended by his blunt answer. “See you around.” And with a wave she hopped into a little Honda and sped away, groceries and all.

It wasn’t til she left his mind wrapped around the fact that she had a birth mark on her hand.

The mark of Poseidon.

She’d been in his grasp the whole time, and he hadn’t made a move!

Now that the pleasantries were over, he scowled in annoyance. “Yes little lamb. You will see me again. If my brothers do not catch you with their teeth first.” His eyes flashed in annoyance. He told himself to be patient, but she had been right there, and he hadn’t noticed it! 

And, worse yet, he’d displayed his powers in front of her.

Now he would have to be extremely careful.

One slip up and she could escape them all for good.

And he wasn’t having that. 

Not for one second. 

~*~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Resources:
> 
> I was inspired in this chapter by the real life cottage in Maine called the 'Lazy Bay' cottage. It is an actual Air B-n-B. I've left the links so you can check out what Rehan would be seeing. Of course the interior is different in my story but I want this story to be an immersive as possible. ;) https://www.airbnb.com/rooms/6480485?irgwc=1&irclid=2qlxoyyXUxyLR5ZwUx0Mo387UkETAJSa0WIlRM0&ircid=4273&sharedid=best-treehouses-usa&af=108670796&iratid=9627&c=.pi73.pk4273_345768&irparam1=art-73068__par-2__act-para_title_link_click__dev-desktop&source_impression_id=p3_1613831423_AmoV6P%2BYOgf8XF2k&guests=1&adults=1
> 
> I also am leaving the links to Ellsworth Harbor Park & Marina, in case you're curious and to give you a better sense of where Rehan is popping up from! :) Click around as well to explore the city, to get a sense of where Delia and Olivia live! https://www.ellsworthmaine.gov/business/economic-development/leisure/harbor-park-marina/


	6. Up to Old Tricks

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Another unexpected encounter and Delia has to make some decisions. Does she risk seeing Marcus? Or does she not?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for your patience while I got this chapter together! Much much LOVE! I hope you enjoy it!

For Cordelia, she had no idea that her own life might be jeopardized at any given time. 

In fact if anything the pale haired chest nut eyed Southerner was – if anything – impossibly happy. 

She hadn’t gotten much farther when it came to figuring out her father’s history or how he’s had a connection with her, or the lack of it actually, (her mother remained stubbornly tight lipped which of course caused friction but there was nothing to be done about that now) but she’d enjoyed meeting Marcus and hoped to see him again soon.

He was handsome but not in a conventional sort of way. 

Tall and brooding like the front of a romance novel and yet there was something strange about the way he held himself. 

Was he a newcomer like she was?

She’d never seen him in town before, but then many of the people who lived here were ‘part-timers’: they stayed when it was warm and left when it got too cold. They owned impressive cottages and property and often frequented the rocky beaches but when the winds changed they held no loyalty to Ellsworth and were gone before the first snow flake fell. 

Slicing her thumb on a rogue thorn brought her swiftly out of her reverie. 

“Damn it.” She mumbled, and put down the roses she was working with. 

There were many types of roses that Dot had taught her about so far (roughly 150!) but today she was carefully mixing the Spray Rose – a delicate bloom smaller than the usual buds but beneficial because they had multiple blooms per stem instead of the typical rose – with the Lilies, the slender wide blossoms contrasting nicely against the dark of the roses and the glass vase. The scent was incredible, but not so much one might become overpowered by it. It was warm and sweet and low, almost sugar like in nature to the senses. 

She had her favorites of course. 

These were awfully nice but if she were honest the begonias and petunias were her favorites with their pastel colored ‘faces’. They reminded her of Alice in Wonderland, which had been her go to, best-loved movie as a child. 

Wrapping her thumb carefully with a wadded tissue, she would wait for the blood to stop coming before she would go back to her work. 

The tinkle of a bell caused her to look up and her heart nearly stopped in her throat.

Speak of the devil.

There he was, the sunlight catching his shoulder length raven hair and revealing the deeper hues of mahogany, scotch and seared almond. He smiled at her widely as he pushed open the glass door, his eyes surprisingly warm – affectionate even, the color of mulled cider mixed with scorched honey.

“Hello there,” his warm bass of a voice made her spine tingle, “you’re a hard woman to track down.” Marcus smiled from ear to ear, the whites of his teeth almost iridescent in the sun. She hadn’t noticed it yesterday but it looked as though he had a fresh pink scratch running down his neck and across his chest, covered by a thin scarlet t-shirt and a black jean jacket that didn’t quite fit him right. 

She supposed she should be alarmed that he’d found her.

She’d only given him her name, hadn’t she?

She searched her memory for clues.

No she had given him her work place while she chattered away while she grocery shopped. 

That was rather stupid of her on the one hand, but on the other she had never expected him to actually show up. 

“I’d bring you flowers but it seems you seem to have your hands full of them already.” Marcus teased, the sound of his laughter musical in nature. It was deep and husky and full of something she couldn’t quite put her finger on. “But will this do?”

She supposed she was to be terrified or nervous he had come to see her. He was a stranger, she didn’t really know him at all. But when he lifted the turquoise colored glass and in it shimmered in the light, her breath stopped in her throat. It was tiny, no bigger than her thumb really, but when the glow caught it she could see several blues within it: deep azure in the bottom, and more turquoise at the top.

“I found it when my brother and I were at the beach. Maine is notorious for treasure.” He teased. “We were on the hunt for it, but when I saw this I thought of you and,” he reached across to her free hand and placed it in there, the tops of his fingertips grazing her skin and sending a shiver down her spine, “I thought you might like it.”

“Oh, thank you.” She hadn’t heard any stories about treasure since she moved there, but maybe he knew something she didn’t? “It’s lovely. Where did you find it?” 

“Have you heard of The Ovens, in Acadia National Park, Bar Harbor? It’s not to far from where I am staying. The park is only about a half an hour’s drive away. I think you’d like it.” He hummed nonchalantly. 

Her brows wrinkled then. “Yeah, I’ve heard of it.” More than heard of it. It was not the kind of place for beginners, that’s what she’d heard...but then looking at him he seemed seasoned by waves and water, unafraid of nature somehow. He let go of her hand. 

“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of a little water and sun.” Marcus quipped, assessing her, and she gulped. 

“No no. I’m not afraid.” She ran her hand around her wounded thumb, tracing it in thought. “But for a first date coffee is usually proficient.” 

“Did I say it was a date, sweetheart?” He chortled and she backtracked. 

“Course not. I mean you didn’t. I mean, I just assumed…”

He grinned further. “You’re cute when you’re flustered.” The charcoal and dense chocolate eyes gleamed at her in amusement. “Can I pick you up at 5, we can have a light dinner and then go exploring?” 

It sounded more than a little dreamy but something in her stomach knotted. It wasn’t just that she actually was nervous around water, it wasn’t just the fact that she knew her mother would have a fit about her going on a date BY the water, (she was super protective of her daughter let alone by the ocean) but there was something else. 

There was a hesitancy in her, to say yes.

Nothing about him screamed ‘dangerous’ but then nothing about Ted Bundy the serial killer had seemed dangerous on first contact either, or so she had heard. 

Women had flocked to him because he was so handsome, even going to the murder trial and going above and beyond to defend him – all based on his looks and charismatic nature. 

It was a little ridiculous she’d compare the two.

She wasn’t sure where it was coming from, really. 

He’d given her no indicator that she should be afraid or wary. 

The sound of the bell tinkling again brought her back to herself. 

Another man entered, his features just as striking as Marcus’ but lighter in color. Where Marcus had dark hair this man had hair the color of wheat left out in the sun, with warm bronze skin and eyes that reminded Delia of the ocean after a stormy day: gray, but with tinges of blue around the center of the pupil. Immediately somehow she knew they were related. 

“So this is where you’re hiding out.” His brother snickered. “I thought I might find you here.”

Something in Marcus’ nature cooled then. It was indistinct, almost untraceable, but there was a hint of annoyance in his muscles as if he wanted to tell the brooding blond ‘not now, I’m busy.’ 

But even if his brother did pick up on it, he seemed to specifically ignore it. 

“Marcus’ told us all about you,” he shot a look at Delia now eyeing her bluntly, “he wasn’t lying. You are gorgeous. No wonder he wanted to come here.” 

“Oh,” her mouth shaped into a small circle and an embarrassed laugh, “that’s too sweet.” 

“Nothing but honesty here.” The new guest grinned. “I’m Trey.”

“Delia.” She muttered. “Nice to meet you.” 

Something about the two of them in the flower shop suddenly made her feel very, very small. 

There it was again, her stomach was squeezing. 

“Don’t let my big brother fool you, there’s a softie underneath his tough bad boy core.” Trey grinned, clearly amused. Marcus however, was not. There was a certain storminess in the dark eyes, directed at his younger brother. 

“I..I’m sure.” She managed.

“My brother was just leaving.” Marcus murmured, a certain edge to his words.

“Was I? I just got here, and I wanna see what the fuss is about.” Lazily, like a cat getting the cream, Trey lounged against the counter completely content. “I mean I can see why he likes you, you’re stunning. But what’s in that brain of yours, pretty lady? That’s what I wanna know.”

His swagger was completely different than his brunette brother’s. Where Marcus was charming and genteel Trey was confident and playful even.

And yet their features had similarities. She could see it in the height, the shape of the muscles, the nose…

They definitely were related, even if they were as different as night and day.

“You flatter me.” She shook her head with a chuckle, and his grin widened.

“No doll. If I was flattering you,” his voice dropped into exquisite flirtation, husky, “you’d know.”

“And that’s quite enough Casanova.” Marcus yanked his brother good-naturedly but there was an underlying gravity to it. 

Delia giggled. “You’ll be very lucky if Dot doesn’t come out here and swat you both with a broom, the ruckus you’re making. She might look like a granny but she doesn’t take crap from anyone.” She whispered in a hush. “And I have to finish these bouquets for Spring Summoning.”

“Spring Summoning? That sounds positively witchy.” Marcus spoke now, eyes gleaming. 

“Yes well it’s a tradition, I have been informed, for good luck. The youngsters of the town get together and have a little dance and the flowers decorate the inside, and they do this to ask Spring to come. Or come faster, that is. It is a little superstitious I guess but it’s darling.” She nodded. 

“I see. Well as I said, consider my offer.” Marcus hummed. Trey rolled his eyes. 

“See, this is why you don’t get girls. You’re supposed to tell them, not ask them.” He snorted on the way out the door.

Delia could see them playfully bickering back and forth and then they disappeared around the corner, probably parked somewhere. 

Once the quiet ensued, her thoughts were filled with the idea of his request.

How was she going to convince her mother to let her go?

Technically she was old enough to not have to ask, she wasn’t a teenager after all, but because it had been just her and her mother for so long they’d developed an unusually tight bond and Delia knew if she didn’t bring it up – if she just slouched off on her own to have this adventure – she’d never hear the end of it. 

She just wasn’t sure how to go about that yet.


	7. Ave Maria Me Revertaris: Return to Me My Little Love

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Familial Connections: Take Two.

She was exhausted, tuckered out by the day. 

He could see that, from the way her chest rose and fell as she slept to the way she snored as she entered REM sleep.

He hadn’t seen her since she was a baby. 

He’d wanted to, he’d tried to send her signs and little gifts here and there but Olivia had always intercepted things and made sure to deter him from reaching out to their daughter. 

His daughter. 

The god was more than a little disgruntled with the way things had turned out. The whole ‘prison’ situation certainly hadn’t made things easy, and though he hadn’t planned on creating any more children [he certainly had plenty – there were an endless list he’d created before the Aquatican/ Atargatisan and Siren betrayal and imprisonment were more than enough] but then after he managed to be free – which was a story in itself – when he found he had created new life with Olivia the Mortal he was actually thrilled.

He hadn’t meant for it to happen of course but the Southern Bell was just so lovely, and on top of that he’d been rather enthusiastic about enjoying life after his imprisonment had ended, so he hadn’t taken the necessary precautions to prevent life...but then he supposed he thought surely at his age he couldn’t bring new life into the world again, could he?

He’d been terribly wrong, but then terribly happy about it. 

Of course she hadn’t understood when he’d tried to explain.

If she hadn’t been pregnant he wouldn’t have bothered to say anything. 

He would have just worked on his revenge on the Atargatisans and Sirens, and worked his way back into seeing his brothers and sisters. 

But Olivia was too important. There was something about the slender redhead that he couldn’t quit. Maybe it was her zeal for life, her quiet strength, the way she got excited over the silliest of things. Certainly her beauty had been a draw in. He remembered the morning after the way the sunlight kissed her skin and made her look as if she were a pale marble statue come to life, practically glowing in the light. With time he knew the pale would turn to red, and the red would turn to warm sunkissed bronze. 

Her hair had looked like fire, like a literal halo of curls around her head, like a phoenix had perched there, and he adored it. 

He supposed he fell in love easily. 

He’d been with everyone from Amphitrite (a minor sea goddess) to Demeter (goddess of harvest/agriculture) and just as much of a lover and he was a chaos maker. His last real conquest had been Thoösa, (daughter of Phorcys, like the original Atargatisans and Sirens ironically enough) but she really hadn’t been any fun. Momentarily, sure, but he hadn’t loved her. 

If he thought about it, his last great love was...well...was it Canace? 

The raven haired beauty had born him five children and he certainly had been incredibly fond of her. Her passing had been devastating to him, though he hadn’t spoken much on it. Like the ocean itself, he turned his grief inwards. 

He’d actually taken up a petition as was done with Achilles, to try and turn her into a god, but it was denied.

He’d made sure his brother Hades took good care of her. The warm haired King of the Underworld had mocked him at first endlessly about the request but when he saw the pain his brother was in, he’d quieted and actually did promise he would care for her well in his domain. 

She’d been the very opposite of Olivia in her looks but equally as stunning: Olivia was fire and ice in her colors, pale creamy skin chestnut russet eyes and hair that looks like it was spun from embers itself, and a slender almost harp like frame. Canace was far warmer in coloration: her skin looked like smooth bronze, her eyes the color of crushed onyx and her hair the color of a raven’s wing. She was far curvier too than the redhead but that wasn’t a bad thing. 

She’d been sweet and gentle, not as feisty as the Southern native. 

He hadn’t really thought of her in ages, he supposed he hadn’t let himself.

Turning back to his sleeping daughter, he looked her over silently. 

She bore much resemblance to Olivia but her hair was far lighter than her mother’s. Blonde. That was surprising. 

Neither he or Olivia had blonde hair, but a few of his brothers did.

Zeus had shocking white blonde hair, for starters. 

On her side of the family too, there may be blondes, but their hair wasn’t as bright, more wheat toned. 

The last time he’d really seen her she’d been six months old and sitting in his lap on a sailing ship. 

He’d taken the form of a sailor both times. 

Olivia had hated the water – she still did – but he’d had a way of charming her. It took work, she was stubborn, but he’d managed...the first time at least. The second time, letting her see the baby, that had been far harder.

When his influence wore off she was very angry.

He knew it wasn’t fair of him, to mesmerize her so, but it was the only thing he could do to let him see his child. 

She’d gone into hiding after that and was ridiculously hard to track down, and beyond that the dratted sea beasts had found a way to imprison him again...but yet again like the devil he’d made his way out.  


He was damn determined to see his daughter, and to protect her from them.

He sensed their ill intentions, and it had made him that much more determined to keep her safe. 

She would be coming into her powers soon too, he was very sure of it.

They might not know that, the wicked Atargatisans and Sirens, but she would. 

Not all of his children had abilities – some of them had been purely mortal – but she had something about her, and it wasn’t just her mother’s creativity. 

“Very soon little one, you’ll have capabilities. I will watch over your progress, and I will keep you from harm.” He murmured.

Let them just try and place a hand on her.

He would make sure they’d regret it. 

~*~


	8. Damp Kindlewood Still Smokes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Every choice we make, there is an action and a response ;)

Delia tapped the side of the spoon on her coffee, lost in thought. 

Usually she fell asleep to the sound of the waves against the rough shoreline but yesterday it’d been impossible. 

Was it sleep paralysis?

No.

She hadn’t had that since she was in eighth grade.

Was it anxiety?

No, she felt very clearly that this had nothing to do with her mental health. 

She had fallen asleep eventually, but it had taken everything in her to get there, which was rather hilarious given the kind of day she’d had. 

“You’re not hungry, Delia?” Her mother had muttered as she poked at her blueberries and oatmeal.

She felt bad. They carpooled together and she didn’t want to make them late, but she just didn’t feel the urge to down the grainy texture.   
Something within her just wouldn’t let her. 

She supposed it probably had to do with the date she was supposed to go on, and the fact that she still wasn’t sure how to go over it with her mother. 

She wanted to tell her, but she was desperately afraid if she did her mother would absolutely rail against the idea. 

Olivia shot her a look under her lashes and arched her brow just a bit. “Are you alright?” It was the fess-up-now look she used to give her when she was a kid.

Delia chewed the inside of her cheek and nodded. “Yeah. I guess I’m just tired.”

It wasn’t a total lie.

She was exhausted.

Her dreams had been strange and twisted and she woke up with a red puffy mark on her wrist. She didn’t remember brushing against poison ivy – was she having an allergic reaction to one of her flowers/fauna? Gerbera* daisies and she didn’t always get along, but they’d never quite caused a reaction like this before. 

She’d put some lotion on it to soothe it before coming down to breakfast and it had helped a little, but not as much as she hoped. 

The car ride over she fiddled with the radio and fidgeted in her seat.

Olivia didn’t comment on her daughter’s restlessness, but she certainly noticed it. She dropped her off at the flower shop and headed off to the library herself.

There were plenty of things she needed to do, (from alphabetizing to checking books for damages to chasing after late fees) but somehow, just like her daughter her gut twisted. 

She’d fought long and hard to keep both of them safe.

She’d thought, despite being by water [which she hated] Ellsworth would be safe for them, but something in her senses was pulling at her. 

“You know you can’t keep me from her forever.” 

That was the last thing he had said to her, but somehow she’d managed to outwit him this long and she wasn’t about to stop now.

He was a mad man.

He had to be. 

Handsome, witty, really funny, but an absolute mad man.

When he’s found out she was going to have Cordelia (who was then nothing but a little nudge of consciousness in her belly) he’d told her he was a god – a Greek god at that – and that he wanted them to be together.

He wanted them to pack up their lives and move to Greece. 

He’d wanted to care for them both.

She’d wanted to believe him, a tiny part of her did, but the more logical part of her knew he was most likely suffering from some derangement and the two of them could wind up dead. 

She’d heard of serial killers that targeted single mothers, women, the insecure.

They promised them the moon and stars and then they killed their victims.

She wasn’t about to let that happen.

So she kept a low profile, and even when she saw traces of him in Cordelia – his smile, his laugh the way she moved her hands – and even when the unexplainable happened (she learned to count seashells awfully fast, she had a fascination with sea life and her first word was ‘gull’, for seagull, fish had an affinity for her and would swim up to her at the park and don’t even get her started on ducks!)Olivia told herself it couldn’t be possibly true. 

It just couldn’t.

She wouldn’t allow herself to consider it.

After all, had he not given her a thoroughly Scottish name, and did he not call Delia Scottish endearments? So how then, did he expect her to believe he was Greek?

Of course, she knew his answer.

He’d technically borrowed the body of a Scotch sailor, he told her. Not quite possession but...close enough. 

Gods didn’t usually take human form. That took an enormous amount of work and energy, and he’d just gotten out of the...what were they, mer-people? Yes. He claimed they’d locked him away, and so he’d had to take the form of a sailor, to transfer his consciousness and energy elsewhere to free himself. 

All of it sounded like a wild ride and she wanted nothing to do with it. 

She just wanted it to be her and Delia, just the two of them.

But it looked like that wasn’t going to happen any time soon. 

He was closing in. She wasn’t sure how, but he was.

And she had to prevent him from harming them both. How, she didn’t know, but she had to. 

The house she’d bought was shrouded in mystery but it did seem to have some witchy charms to it. When they’d first gone through it piece by piece she’d noticed light inscriptions on the walls. 

They’d painted around them, but not over them.

Cordelia wondered of course, but Olivia felt in her bones to paint over them would be disrespectful, and she’d been right. 

A little internet search and she found the original owners of the home and anyone they sold to usually had a connection to magic or the supernatural.

The house was clearly Victorian built, but the land went back even farther. Witches had lived there and blessed the ground, and before them it was rumored there was a group of villagers who worked with the fairies to keep the land sacred and safe. There was protection in it, and she was comforted by that. 

Technically speaking he could still enter the home if he wanted to, but if he tried to harm them, the house had a consciousness of it’s own and would protect them, if the transcriptions she read were correct.

It was ironic she didn’t believe him, but she believed in the House, but something about the way they scribbled their spells with care and love made her believe in the structure and the sanctity of it. 

She parked the car now.

The air smelled low and sweet and full of blossoms.

Full of promise.

The sun ran it’s long golden fingers over everything and soaked it to it’s core.

Winter couldn’t hold out much longer.

She hoped with it would come good things. 

The day passed slowly. She had plenty to do and phone calls to make and events to plan (there was a COVID-19 safe conference for librarians they’d be holding and she was trying desperately to get the planning together perfectly) and when she finally finished her day and threw herself into her little busted Honda she wanted to cry.

She was exhausted, all the way down to her bones.

Her daughter was quiet during the drive home and contented herself on her phone. 

Olivia whipped up a quick dinner (spaghetti with spicy tuna ragout) and then Cordelia asked to hang out with a friend to help her study (was it Julie? Ginny? Olivia couldn’t remember) and she’d actually obliged. Usually she’d grill her daughter about who they were and what they wanted, but tonight for once she was spent.

She was excited to get the evening alone for once. 

There was a hot bath with her name on it and she couldn’t wait to slip into it.

But oh, had she known the consequences of not grilling her further, may just maybe she would have thought twice on the matter. 

~*~

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Gerbera = a type of flower, a daisy. They come in yellow, orange, white, pink or red typically and are common in bouquets. 
> 
> In case you want a better look:   
> https://images.app.goo.gl/pbeyhi2eNQMDZK6u6
> 
> In case Olivia's dinner made you hungry! Recipe below:   
> https://www.delicious.com.au/recipes/10-minute-spaghetti-spicy-tuna-ragout-save-tuesday/baddede0-859b-429e-9be5-ad38cb683ec6?r=recipes/collections/u7a5b4t1


	9. Baby, We're On the Edge Tonight

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A water date with the literal devil. Rehan/Marcus + Delia ;) He's got a job to do and he hasn't forgotten that. Will he manage it though? Or will fate intercede and save Cordelia's neck?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Threat of graphic violence to a main character in this chapter. 
> 
> Read at your own will! :)

She’d never done anything like this before. 

He could see that written all over her face.

At first he thought she might not come. 

It had taken a few more ‘spontaneous’ visits at The Bloomerang Bin as well as flowers sent and a coffee, (the usual human endeavors at ‘attraction’) but finally he seemed to win her over.

He wasn’t sure what excuse she gave her parental figure.

He didn’t really care. 

The idea of close contact with a ‘mother’ was strange to him anyhow. As soon as their young were out of their shells they were on their way. There was no motherly process. It was more reptilian than anything else, or like a sea turtle. 

Nurturing wasn’t really on the docket.

Of course if the Atargatisans were female they stayed with the pod and the pod Mother, but if they were male they were typically singularly on their own. 

Male bull Atargatisans didn’t really swim in pods. They might negotiate territory where several of them had a loose alliance, (like his ‘brothers’) but the testosterone made them aggressive when too many of them were together.

They fought over food, resources, mates.

It was better they distance themselves. 

He brought himself back to her. 

They’d walked along the shoreline carefully, he’d pointed out the different colored stones – the muted lavender and seal gray, warm cinnamon and dusty rose, burnt charcoal and even an off shade of blue – and she’d found it immensely charming. 

She’d never been near the water before. He felt it in her energy.

It was nervous, radiating, practically sparkling off it.

He adored it, her energy, but not for the reasons one might think.

He was hungry for destruction of course, but the back and forth cat and mouse aspect thrilled him.

Rehan [‘Marcus’ to her, because much like a demon giving a mortal your real name gave them power over you, and he was not about to have that] enjoyed flexing his intellectual skill. He wanted to be successful and bring in the kill (no pun intended) but he also wanted to play. 

To draw it out.

To enjoy the hunt, the same way human hunters could sit in a forest for hours just waiting for that perfect big buck or plump turkey to graze by, unsuspecting. 

Of course he knew from the humans’ point of view, this might make him seem psychopathic in nature, but he didn’t view it this way.

It was no different than a great white shark circling and circling, waiting for the perfect moment to descent.

He was sweet to her, he lured her in.

He sensed she was beginning to trust him.

Maybe even hold affection for him.

The idea of him returning it of course was laughable.

That’d be like the butcher returning feelings for the cow.

He had a job to do, and while he’d enjoy what led up to the job, ultimately he’d get it done. 

The wind shifted a little, ruffling his dark hair. She smiled at him and reached up a hand to brush it out of his eyes playfully. He captured her wrist, causing her mouth to form a tiny marvelous little ‘O’ and he tugged on it: but only in returned playful jest.

It wasn’t quite time.

Yet. 

The sun was sinking into the water, burning it’s way into the waves, splaying the sky with hot red and buttery yellows, burnt oranges and siennas. They’d had a light dinner, and then he’d easily convinced her it was a good idea to walk by the beaches. 

His ‘brothers’ were playing look out to make sure he could finish things quietly.

He wondered if he should let her drown (she clearly had no experience with water) or put his hands around her throat until she turned a lovely shade of blue.

It’d be easier to choke her out – drowning could cause attention...but oh how lovely it was to see a human drown. At least he and the female Atargatisans were similar that way.

They loved to drag people in (specifically men, if one were honest) much like the early fairy tales warned, their long gleaming tails careful to brush their victim only the slightest as they swam, the sounds their songs haunting as consciousness slipped from their prey. 

Cordelia watched the waves intently, as they seemed to be painted by a burning sky. 

He chuckled and slipped his feet near the water, but was careful not to get in it. 

The transformation from human back to Atargatisan was not one he wanted to make now.

Rehan had to wait til the right moment, and then it would add to her terror, to see his true face.

His monstrous gnashing teeth, powerful tail and long hair like fibers. 

She wouldn’t believe how the human frame tore away into nothingness to reveal his silver chest and tail, his sharp talons.

Were he in his final form he could have cut across her cheek, instead of gently touching it to be ‘tender’. 

Tenderness.

What stupidity. 

What uselessness. 

She was ebbing closer to the water now, even taking off her shoes. 

He felt the hunger rise in him to drag her in right then and there – but no, no, he had to be patient. 

Her smile was brilliant, it reached up into her eyes and wrapped around the corners of her cheeks. It was a pity really. She was pretty, and she did smell delightful. 

Perhaps if she wasn’t of Poseidon’s lineage, he could have played a while longer.

But this was urgent and he knew it.

It was rare the females would come to the bulls, unless it was mating season of course.

Even then, they were shy. 

So when Delphine came to them and asked for help, and told them about the deal they had with the Sirens, he knew it had to be serious.

Delphine. 

The thought of the athletic, feisty minded Atargatisan made him grin.

Now there would be a conquest.

She hadn’t laid with bulls yet this year, and she was very choosy on her mates. 

She’d only had 2 separate hatches of eggs, and she interspersed them between years. Some Atargatisans laid eggs every year, she did not. 

If he could have her…

...but he pulled himself back to the task at hand.

Cordelia was bent over, examining the sand. She let it drift through her fingers gently, mesmerized.

Rehan went to make his move then, as her vision was obscured – 

– the wind shifted, and in it, he made himself draw back from the brink of attack, irritation in his face.

What were they doing here? 

He could smell them, the scent of their feathers making his lips curl against his teeth. 

He was absolutely irrevocably enraged, and he was having a hard time hiding it. 

Sirens. 

What in the actual f*ckery were they doing here?

Weren’t the Atargatisans and the Sirens supposed to be on the same team?

Cordelia noticed his change in mood, his energy, and he had to compose himself quickly but dammit this ruined everything!

THIS had been the perfect moment. He had her right by the water’s edge, even comfortable enough to play in the water...and the blasted Sirens had shown up!

That was just like them though.

He should have known they would backtrack on their deal.

Perhaps they wanted the glory of the kill for themselves, he did not know.

What he did know though, was that this was maddening because it required a different tactic now. Meanwhile Poseidon could be gaining strength and adding to his lineage again! 

An inward snarl.

“Are you alright?” She murmured, and Rehan had to fix his face.  
“Yes I...I’m sorry.” He fumbled, and she furrowed her brow.

“What’s the matter? Your face is all cloudy.” The blonde persisted.

The poor sweet dumb little thing.

“Oh I, I just remembered something.” Rehan fibbed easily, like any serial killer might. “Brought up a memory.”

“Is it in regards to your family?” Cordelia murmured. 

“One could say that. We’re not as tight knit as everyone here is.” He hummed, his bass voice a deep murmur. 

“Oh I...I’m sorry.” Her face fell. 

“It’s nothing you did.” He crossed his arms over his body, and she tipped her head. The breeze played with her hair, and the gentle floral scent filled his nose. 

“I know. But I don’t like seeing you in distress.”

“You barely know me, Delia.” He hummed back in return. 

What was it with humans that they made attachments so quickly? It wasn’t just with animals, it was with people. If they liked you, they aligned themselves with you so rapidly. It reminded him of Maggie and Blue Goose Get-A-Way where he and his brothers were staying. Maggie treated them as if they were nothing more than lost, overgrown puppies in need of care. 

He was 6’2, Keoni was 6 foot even and Ophir was roughly 6’4. All of them were bulky muscular men (in human form) that looked like they ate whole cows for breakfast. 

And yet Maggie didn’t seem particularly intimidated at all.

If anything her loneliness drove her to chatter all about her life, her son, her husband Richie who had passed on last year, and how ‘nice it was’ to see ‘growing strapping boys again.’ 

She absolutely adopted them.

In the water if a calf was rejected, it was rejected.

That’s it.

Adoptions weren’t really a thing, with the sea beasts. 

Looking at Delia he felt an odd feeling of not understanding her.

He was a predator in every sense of the word and she wanted to play therapist.

Rehan snorted. She lifted a brow. 

“Isn’t that what dating is?” She asked finally. 

“Hmm?” His eyes fell on her small form and now it was his turn to twitch a brow.

“You said I don’t really know you – isn’t that the purpose of dating?” She teased gently, and pulled one of his crossed arms away from his chest and into her slim hand.

“Yes. I suppose it is.” He answered, but he was distracted.

There were shadows crossing.

Someone was coming. Or several someones.

Not only had the sirens interrupted his mission then, they were going to get directly involved it seemed.

Rehan was far from happy about it, but there seemed little he could do to stop them.

For right now, at least. 

~*~


	10. Of Devils and Angels

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A meeting of two minds - two very opposite minds - and missions!

Rehan could see them clear as day approaching now, their hazy golden wings outstretched behind them in a relaxed easy going manner. 

To Cordelia though, she wouldn’t be able to see their wings. 

Even if she was a child of Poseidon, their glamour was strong. 

Mortals saw what the sirens wanted them to see, and right now it wouldn’t be beneficial for her to see their wings.

They were rare, male sirens.

Very little was heard about them in literature.

Even Rehan himself was surprised by them choosing to step in and intervene. 

It wasn’t like them, especially if their female counterparts had made a very clear alliance with his kind that together they would stand against Poseidon and not let him reek havoc on their kin.

Apparently the male sirens hadn’t gotten that memo.

It made sense, in one way.

They didn’t have the same mental link the Atargatisans had so information traveled slower to them. Still he’d thought something of this magnitude, word would spread, would it not?

It wasn’t in their direct interest to align themselves with Poseidon, so why were they doing it?

Delia seemed nervous and he tried his best to soothe her – which was ironic, considering he was trying to drown her moments ago. 

Now he would have to reformulate everything.

The Sirens wouldn’t show up out of nowhere.

Someone had tipped them off of his presence, him and his brothers. And what’s more, someone was looking to stop him.

Was the Sea King?

The god of the ocean?

It was a strange thought to think. He’d never cared much about his children before, or well if he did, not to the point where he was getting directly involved with their lives.

What was it about this one that made Poseidon act?

For a second, Rehan looked her over.

She was as human as human could be and yet…

Had he missed something?

Was there something the brunette wasn’t understanding?

Could she really be more than just a silly naive girl?

He looked for just a moment at her long, slender swan like neck. Were there gills hidden under the creamy complexion? Power running in those tiny veins?

Had he misjudged her potential?

No, it was impossible. 

There was just no way, right?

The god had been stripped of his ability to transfer powers, hadn’t he? 

The Atargatisan shivered just the same. She thought he was cold and curled into him, her body heat a blessed releif against the chill of the air. Dinner had been light, his stomach still rumbled. He’d thought he could get this over with then fish for some raw mackerel. 

It’d be easy to continue down Route 102 and onto Route 102A to Manset and Manset Town Landing. He would have to be careful, it was a favorite fishing spot for many, but he knew a couple of hidden spots that where he wouldn’t be bothered. 

He could drag his jagged teeth along the mackerel and be left to be wild in peace. 

But no, this wasn’t to be. Now he had to start all over. Mentally he rolled his eyes. His brothers and he would get together at the little bed and breakfast and hammer something out, but what he wasn’t sure and he HATED being unsure.

He was used to being confident and strong.

This definitely threw him off. 

“We’ve been looking everywhere for you.” One of them was speaking now to Delia. He wasn’t as tall as Rehan by any means but he managed to carry himself was a certain kind of confidence usually reserved for taller men. He cocked his head to the side, his sandy hair covering his eyes for a moment. 

There were three of them, just like with Rehan, Keoni and Ophir.

Carefully matched.

Yes, this definitely was not a coincidence. The brunette felt felt his muscles stiffen in agitation. He wanted to shout and yell and go on the offensive, to pluck every feather out of the Siren’s back, but if he did that, it would just cause more trouble and blow his cover.

His date however, didn’t seem to notice the tension, at least not right away.

“Y-you have?” Cordelia murmured, easily entranced. 

She was a smart woman and yet how could she hope to resist a Siren? Homer had been correct when he’d written the Odyssey, and written the sailors had to stuff their ears so not to hear the Sirens song.

When the man spoke it wasn’t quite sing-songy but it was enchanting non the less. Any human would have had difficulty not completely turning into a mushy noddle head for brains. 

Rehan growled.

 _This one is mine._ He seemed to say, his mouth drew into a viper’s snarl, but the Siren ignored him and gazed right at Delia. 

“Your mother will be very worried.” He murmured gently, offering her a hand. “You know being around this man is not safe at night. The sun has slipped into the water. Night time dates are risky, and you know how she feels about water.”

“She’s not a pilgrim.” Rehan grumbled, and Cordelia looked between the two of them.

“Marcus?” Her brow furrowed now, and she looked between the golden haired Siren and Rehan, absolutely bewildered. “Tha-that’s silly. Marcus isn’t going to hurt me.”  
Poor sweet lamb. If only she knew. 

“Absolutely not. Now if you don’t mind, we’re actually on a **date** . ” Rehan/’Marcus’ eyes were flecked with burning embers of oozing caramel and onyx, rage clearly boiling over. This was his prey! His mission – not theirs!

“You’d go on a date when you knew family was coming to town?” The 2nd man spoke up, not as blond as the first but with more of a russet red tinge to his hair. He modified his voice the more he spoke to sound Southern, like her. “Surely you can’t have forgotten your cousins from Gunthrie!” 

They weren’t family.

Rehan knew that. But he was even more so that humans were so easily enamored anything a Siren said to them while they were under charm, they would accept.

“Oh!” She blushed gently. “Mama didn’t say anything?”

“We wanted to surprise her.” He lied easily. “I haven’t seen you seen you were tinier than a crayfish.” That 2nd Siren answered with a fib. “David, remember? Davvie? And Alex and Mack?” He motioned to the men behind him.

If one didn’t know better one would think they were telling the truth, but they were absolutely making it up as they went along, and it was infuriating. What’s more, his like own brethren those names were 100 percent nonsense, but they certainly sounded credible. 

“I don’t remember. I’m...I’m sorry. I must have been awfully little.” She flustered, and Rehan slipped his hand into hers as if to make them back off. ‘Davvie’ lowered his own hand and frowned.

“Surely she can meet up with you later? I’m sure if you’ve come all the way from Kentucky you’re exhausted, and I’m sure you’re starving for a home cooked meal. Delia’s mother will be more than happy to see you.” Rehan intervened then craftily. 

Two could play at this game, after all.

‘Davvie’ frowned. “We aren’t staying at her house. We’ve made other arrangements.” Davvie answered.

 _I bet you have._ Rehan thought with a snarl inwardly, but tried to control his face. “After all, she’d a grown woman, and an intelligent one too.” He laid it on thick and ducked his face down to press a light kiss to her temple. To any outsider he would have been the picture of sweetness and romance, the enamored youth so to speak. He pulled her in a little tighter, his nose brushing her hair.

She smelled incredible, he had to admit. She smelled of fresh flowers and earth after it rained, mixed with her own feminine composure. 

He gritted his teeth inwardly. If only he didn’t have to end her so soon…

But no, he was on a mission, and by the looks of it so were the Sirens. 

The blond man narrowed his eyes at Rehan’s false tenderness, and inwardly again the bull Atargatisan wondered why. Was it treasure he was after? Was it something greater? Power? He couldn’t fathom it. Whatever it was it was something large and important.

“We’d really prefer if she comes with us.” Davvie grunted. 

“But she really doesn’t know you, from the sounds of it. You’re just as much as a stranger to her as I am.” Rehan answered smoothly. 

For Cordelia there absolutely was a tug and pull. She wanted to stay with her date, Rehan could feel the nervous energy bubbling hopelessly inside her – and yet her sense of duty (matched with a sense of damnable Southern hospitality that guests were here on her accord and she was not prepared) tugged at her equally. 

He knew then, as frustrating as it was, he had to let her go.

Like any skilled fisherman, sometimes one knew when the catch was not ready.

Not big enough.

It had been ready, but those stupid Sirens had interrupted everything, and he knew if he pushed too hard she would push back against him and the whole thing could be ruined.

He released her then, gently kissing the top of her hand for good measure.

“We’ll meet again little love. It’s alright. I can see they’re anxious to get you home. I’m not upset. Another opportunity will come another day.”

“But – ” Her lips quivered, unsure.

“I promise.” He hummed charmingly, but looked directly into the Sirens eyes.   
_This isn’t over yet._

Not by a long shot.


	11. Facing the Facts and Magic Pacts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The supernatural meets the...natural ;) a meeting of two minds!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for your patience! I got the 2 other stories up [The one shot Dracula and the other one shot Marriage Story/Charlie Barber fic] up, and it took me some time to get this up BUT I didn't forget about you loves!

She’d wanted to yell at her when she came home.

To scream at her and shout at her and shake her for being so stupid. 

At the same time, when Delia’s small face dimmed by night time came into view, hair plastered to her head now because of the rain, all Olivia could do was utter a small cry and wrap her daughter up in her arms and hug her.

“Where were you? What were you doing out there? I thought you said you were studying?” The fevered questions came. 

She’d been lying in the bathtub taking some ‘me time’ for once, the scent of crunchy apricot exfoliating scrub fresh on her skin and pungent in the air when suddenly she had gotten that excruciating feeling only mothers seem to know, that something was not right. 

She’d leapt up from her bath, bubbles still clinging to her thighs as she threw the fuzzy terra-cotta colored bathrobe over herself and put on her house shoes, determined. 

She started with the friend that Cordelia said she was studying with, and when Julie said no, she’s not here, the auburn headed mother felt her stomach turn to ice. 

She tried to replay a million conversations in her head, to pull apart or fish out where her daughter could have gone and why she wouldn’t have said anything. Usually they had an incredibly close relationship. It didn’t make sense that Delia would lie on purpose about something. The only reason was if a.) she felt frightened of someone (or something) or b.) it was something her fair haired daughter thought she would never approve of. 

Neither of them had enemies in this town, because laughably they hadn’t been living here long enough to make them, and so most likely it was that Delia had gotten into her head that she was going to do something, and she didn’t want Olivia to know.

Was it in regards to her biological father?

That question had haunted her.

Had she pieced something together and taken a train somewhere, to try and solve the ‘mystery’ of her parentage?

This was the primary thought that swung within her head when the doorbell rang and Delia’s face came into view, followed by three strange men.

She’d gotten her gun before she opened the door, a sharp small little pistol. It wouldn’t do much good, most likely, but she felt like she had to bring something with her.

The man spoke first, his eyes the color of warm butterscotch and claiming he was a cousin, that he’d found her by the water on a date. Called himself ‘Davvie.’ She did have a cousin named Davvie, but she hadn’t seen him in years – and she found it interesting when she tried to recall his face, it was blurry.

Everything about this Davvie made her feel blurry and uncertain.

“We were hoping to surprise you. Brought Mack and Alex with me.” He continued easily, shoulders relaxed. Something about him though, it didn’t quite fit. He had the same soft Southern drawl as she did, and he seemed awfully calm. But something seemed off. 

Still in the moment she’d nodded solemnly and put the pistol aside and opened the door for them, hugging Cordelia tightly and pressing a kiss to her head.

She couldn’t even be mad right then and there because she was so exhausted from worry. 

“Why wouldn’t you just tell me?” She’d asked Delia, and the blonde had blushed in shame. She smelled like brine and sea water, pants sandy. “If you wanted so badly to go on a date, you could have gone anywhere within Ellsworth. Especially for a first date. Martha’s Diner. Airline Brewing Company. Even Serendib!” She’d tossed her hands in the air. “But you know how I feel about the ocean!”

“We did go out to eat first.” Cordelia had hummed, and crossed her arms across her chest. “And we were only going for a walk when cousin Davvie and his buddies found us. Ruined the whole date!” She huffed and frowned at them. “He’ll probably never ask me out again now!” She sputtered.

It was clear she hadn’t wanted to go ‘home’ with them, but finish the rest of her date. 

If Marcus hadn’t been so insistent she go, (and not to be completely rude to family) she would have stayed. 

“I’m gonna go take a shower.” She huffed again, and Olivia sighed and nodded. 

She wanted to ask her daughter all sorts of things, like who this man was she went out with and why she felt she could be so grumpy in front of ‘family,’ but instead she let herself breathe inwardly, and let her daughter slide past them and up the creaky steps. 

When she disappeared up the landing, Olivia exhaled finally. 

“Thank you for finding her.” She muttered. She was still very mistrustful but there wasn’t much she could do in the situation. “Thank god for kismet.” She padded into the center of the house now and they trailed behind her. 

She expected perhaps for them to say how lovely it was.

Everyone usually did. 

Though narrow, it was adorable and brightly decorated with pillows and nick-nacks and had a certain cozy level of comfort to it and that usually charmed guests. 

But ‘Davvie’ did not say that. 

If anything he observed her quietly before finally, gently calling her name.

She turned, and with it his glamour fell. 

She paled immediately and backed up, her body flush against the kitchen cabinets. 

“W-what are you?” She gulped and grasped for her faithful pistol.

“You know that’s not going to do any good against us.” The man muttered, and her frown deepened. 

“We’ll see about that. The kiss of metal usually scares off intruders.” Olivia grunted, and he smiled.

“But we’re not intruders. You invited us right in.” He reached out a hand and put it on the front of the gun, and pushed it gently away from them.  
“What do you want?” She hissed a little more brazenly, terrified but unable to back down. 

“We want what you want, the safety of your daughter.” He answered her, gesturing to himself and his friends. 

“Why?” She answered, her mouth drawn into a tight line. They still smelled like the ocean, it tickled her nose and infuriated her further. 

“It is in our best interest, and the one who sent us.”

“Th-the one who sent you? You’re not angels. Cherubim.” She snapped then. “You might have the wings but that doesn’t mean anything!”

“Olivia,” Alex spoke now, “Why don’t you sit down? You’re tired. You’re frightened. We can explain as best we can. Mack, make her a cup of cinnamon tea, would you? She’s shaking.”

“You’re not telling one of your cronies to make ME tea in MY own house!” The gun went off then, the bullet flew through the air and paused before it reached Alex, Mack or Davvie. 

Alex reached out and grabbed the floating bullet and set it on the counter.

“There’s no need for that. Listen, I know you’re upset and scared and frustrated. But if you want to keep your daughter safe, you have to calm down and hear us out.”

“Fine.” Olivia said, but her mouth was drawn into a tight, hard line. “Talk. And don’t skimp on details. Don’t tell me some mystical shit. Tell me the truth.”

“Alright.” Alex answered, and Mack came back with the tea. He pushed it gingerly to her. She accepted it, though irritably. 

So they spoke. They claimed they were male Sirens, (which explained the wings) and the fact that they had made an agreement with Poseidon to watch over Delia – whether she wanted it or not – and that especially so there was a disturbance in the water, and something was after her daughter. They didn’t know what exactly. The female Sirens seemed to know, but they were strangely tight lipped about the issue. 

He explained about the Atargatisans too, and that they were really what humans so mistakenly called “mermaids” or “mermen.” How they were hunters and predators and how he (Davvie) felt like they had something to do with this but he didn’t know exactly what. 

When they finished she was very quiet, her large eyes shimmering with thought.

“I don’t want to believe it. Any of it. Our whole lives we’ve been running from this.”

“I know.” Alex crooned gently. “It is very difficult for a human to believe – not because you aren’t intelligent or capable but because it challenges your whole world view. But you cannot lie in ignorance. If the Atargatisans are up to something, I believe you have a right to be wary of the water. They want her for something. I cannot say for sure whether the man she was with was one or not, but something didn’t seem right with me.” He muttered.   
“You must teach her to use her abilities, to not be afraid of them.”

A big deep breath then on Olivia’s part. “I don’t...she doesn’t…”

“She does, Olivia, and you know it. She may be mainly human, but there’s something in her of the Greek god and you know it.” Mack answered then, chocolate hues steady.

“How would I even go about doing that?” She finally murmured, feeling so small in the matter. So helpless. She hated it. 

“Well for starters, you probably don’t want to keep her from her dad.” Davvie finally chimed in. “He’d know a lot about training her.”

“So he was telling the truth. All this time.” The Scotch sailor body he’d inhabited, the truth about his heritage. He hadn’t been lying. The weight of it made her want to curl up into herself. 

You could have been happy with him all this time. Her mind said, and she felt guilt wash over her. He’d begged her to leave everything for Greece but she’d refused. But to her credit, it was a wild story.

“Yes.” Alex murmured. 

“I don’t...I don’t know. It’s a lot to take in.” The tea filled her senses. It was a good choice. The cinnamon played on her tongue, soothing her. 

“Sleep on it.” Mack answered. 

“Well, what about you guys?” She gestured then. Her mind was still numb with shock, but rapidly coming to terms with things. The most important thing after all, was keeping Delia safe and alive. 

“We’ll be around. We’ll watch over her, as we always have. If you want, we can stay tonight to guard the house to make sure they,” he emphasized, “don’t come back for a round 2.” 

“Y-es.” She sipped the tea again. “I think that’d be wise. Then we can plan, in the morning.”

“Sounds good little mortal.” Davvie answered. “Rest now. We will make sense of it.”

She hoped he was right. Her mind was rattling around faster and faster, and she felt as though she could pass out from sheer exhaustion.

All she wanted was to keep Delia safe.

She had done that successfully by running for years, but now she knew.

She couldn’t run.

The danger was too great.

They were going to have to face this down.

Even though it terrified her.


	12. Different Faces of Frustration

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Goals need accomplishing, but how and when?

It was infuriatingly difficult to get to her now. 

Her ‘cousins’ as they called themselves (which Rehan knew very well were not related to her in the least) always seemed to hang around the house at the most inconvenient moment. 

He’d reconvened with his brothers on how they might go about things, but they had to admit to themselves, they were stuck. 

The typical tactics weren’t going to work because the male Sirens with their big fluffy wings and sharp eyes (and even sharper talons) were incredibly protective of the girl and her mother. 

This seemed to annoy Delia, and Rehan felt perhaps he could use that annoyance to his advantage, to split the two of them apart, but the details on how still hadn’t come to him.

And if he were honest he felt almost dehydrated in this human body.

He missed the wide great ocean, feeling the currents like energy through his system.

The ability to go where he wanted and when.

The great wildness of it, the smell of algae and sea and salt on the wind, the way the sun kissed his back honey lemon gold tenderness, especially in the mornings. 

He missed the hunt.

And not just the foolish hunt of a mortal girl who should have been dead by now.

He missed jockeying with great whites, fighting for resources among predators, keeping an eye out for octopus, and snatching one when they weren’t paying attention and on their A-game. 

He found this human form stifling. 

He didn’t know why mortals always insisted ‘mermaids’ and ‘mermen’ (a term he found incredibly insulting) always dreamed about being human in their stories.

They certainly did not.

They had a certain wildness humans could not understand, but then humans were always trying to change and domesticate their environment to their liking. Look what they did to wolves after all. Turned them into dogs.

Atrocious.

He snarled slightly, allowing his legs and feet to dip into the water. The others could try and lure her in tonight.  
His muscles ached from being in this body, and the sky had settled into silent lavender gray, and most of the harbor men had gone home for the night.

He felt the fibers of his legs trying to shift back into a powerful tail, but he always lifted his ‘feet’ before they could. 

“Fancy finding you here.” A voice called to him.

Low. Sultry. Sweet as honey but sharp as pepper. 

Delphine.

“You’re a long way from home.” He grumbled gently, as she lounged herself by a buoy. 

It was dark but not so dark he could not make out the shape of her. The upper half of her was human for right now, but he knew the lower half of her from the waist down was the body of a powerful killer, a sea predator and what could only be classified as an athlete. 

Above water her hair-like outgrowths looked like rich chocolate curls with an almost auburn undertone within the curl pattern. They framed her heart shaped face, and her large dark eyes to any sailor would have been a combination of possible sin mixed with amber and scotch, along with a heart stopping full pout. He knew what lay behind those eyes though, that honeyed voice. 

That voice would tempt a thousand men straight into the water, but not he.

But that was only because they were of the same kind. 

They understood each other, the delicate knife like balance between beauty and monster. 

“We all have our missions.” She crooned, and he raised a brow. 

“You, on a mission? You don’t say.” He answered, and she chuckled, but she kept herself at a distance from him.

Even being what they were, there was no real sense of loyalty. 

“How does it go?” Her tone softened, inquiring.

Rehan frowned. “I hate it.” He scoffed. Surprise lit up her eyes.

“Why?” A tilt of the head, the long dark chocolate curls brushing her curves.

“For the same reason you would. They,” he motioned at the docks, the place of the humans, “are clumsy and illogical and unbearable to be around. Helpless as babies. Cute,” he grunted, “but you spend enough time with them and your brain wants to melt through your ears.”

“Ah, I see.” She chuckled at him. “I take it the mission isn’t going as well as you thought it would then?”

“I mean it’s going alright, it’s just long and boring.”

“You, Rehan, bored?” She drawled, and flipped her long tail. It was a deep emerald color, though like an octopus or squid she could change color if she needed to. “I’m shocked.”

“I am too actually.” He rolled his powerful shoulders, his neck and inhaled. It felt so foreign to him, air in lungs. 

“Is it boredom or is it pent up frustration?” She chided, a wild and wide smile on her face. 

“A bit of both, actually.” He eyed her then, taking in the fullness of her form and the way the water gleamed on her skin. Even in this body he felt hungry for her, and all that she represented.

He wondered what her mouth would taste like – fresh fruit and a splash of the sea, mixed with a softer floral?

No.

That was the human in him talking.

Kissing her would be like kissing the ocean itself: completely wild and full of deep dark secrets and danger.

There would be nothing soft and precious and floral like about Delphine. 

She was like the Amazon women.

Powerful and threatening and worth the chase, dark and deep like spiced licorice or rum. Heady. 

There was nothing ‘tender’ about her, and he loved that. 

“Come hunt with me?” She spoke now.

“That is not usually something our kin do – mix that way. You know as bulls we are aggressive.” He frowned. 

“Yes, but you know we can be too, and it looks like you need to get the aggression out.” She slipped off the buoy, her form shifting in the water as she did. It was painful, they both knew that, but she made it look effortless, like a ballerina in water.

He grumbled.

“You don’t want to hunt?” She teased. “You must be with people too long.”

“No,” Rehan answered, “it’s just I know it will be difficult to go back here,” he huffed, “once I am there.”

“The constant tug and pull.” A nod. “Somehow though, you can handle it. Who knows. It might even refresh you.” She bated.   
He knew he wasn’t supposed to leave Ellsworth, but Delphine was more than a little persuasive. 

And if he were honest, she was right – the distraction from his current stress could actually rejuvenate his senses and his creativity for the other hunt he was on.

“Alright.” He chuffed. “I suppose a small dip in the water wouldn’t kill me.”

He knew it wasn’t going to be a small dip, but somehow he couldn’t – or wouldn’t – tell her no.

~*~ 

As the Atargatisans were enjoying the water, across the city in the tiny Victorian house as the sky deepened from gray to lavender to inky blue black, the male Sirens took turns watching and waiting.

The confrontation couldn’t be long.

The Atargatisans, once they realized what the Sirens were up to, would try to strike again.

They’d already sniffed around the house looking for weak points.

‘Alex’ did not hope for violence, but he knew it may not be avoided: especially once the message reached their female brethren of their ‘betrayal.’

The Atargatisans and the female Sirens had made a pact. They had found out about this after Poseidon asked them to protect his daughter, and they had agreed. Still, he didn’t regret it.

Like Rehan, he and his brothers had names very different from their human presentation. But for their sake, he let them call him Alex. He did not mind.

‘When are you going to tell her the truth about us?’ Alex had asked Olivia, but she had shaken her head.

‘Just let her live in innocence a little while longer.’ Her mother had responded.

‘Innocence will get her killed.’ Mack had answered, wrapping his arms around his great barrel chest. ‘You know this. Don’t coddle her.’ 

‘Patience, Jephrem.’ Davvie/Zafar had said to his brother. ‘This can’t be easy on them. They’ve had to deal with a lot already.’ 

‘It’s nothing compared to what they will face, if this turns into an all out Sea War.’ Jephrem/Mack had grunted, his eyes like two flecks of ice in his face, piercing and unyielding. 

Alex watched her now, her sleeping form curled into the too tight, cramped bed. 

She was beautiful, and she pulsed with power.

He wondered silently how Olivia could have kept that hidden from the rest of the world? It hummed around her aura like an electric fence. It buzzed in her bloodstream.  
They had glamour magic, but what magic had Olivia used, human though she was?

It could have just been love.

He refused to believe that.

Love was powerful, but he did not think it so powerful it could cloak the young woman from everything else supernatural in the world – could it?

Her lashes fluttered on her face.

She moved in her sleep, her face contorting for a moment, then smoothing into relaxation.

He took a moment to drop the heavy glamour, and stretch his wings for a moment. It was cramped in her room, even more so for the Siren. 

His wings ached. 

He needed to stretch them soon, but that couldn’t be accomplished until his shift was over and Jephrem took over. He strode over to a window and cracked it slightly, the breeze crossing his face just so.

He still wasn’t 100 percent sure how they were going to handle this. Zafar had some ideas, but they ended with bloodshed and Alex wanted to avoid that if he could. 

She shifted again, and he watched her dream.

He had never dreamed before.

He hoped whatever filled her mind, it was lovely.

She deserved peace more than anyone, for once.


	13. And You Might Be the Death of Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I promised you an adventure, you're about to get it. ;)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is VERY intense but stay with me!

Cordelia knew she had to be dreaming.

She just knew. 

With everything going on, there was no way she could get near the ocean and yet in this lucid dream, here she was among the pebbled sand, the sun kissing her pale frame and leaving it pink and stinging in its wake. It was not an unpleasant feeling, even if she wasn’t used to it.

The sky was falling into dusk, the violet sweep falling into burning gold and softer shades of tangerine and bloody red in some spots, cooling into indigo and sweeping marbled blue blacks towards the edge of the waters’ mouth. Stars weren’t yet pin pricks in the sky but the moon in all her wisdom hung like a dove gray brooch, smooth and cool and omnipresent as the sun fell into the ocean and tucked herself in goodnight. 

Delia stooped for a moment and ran her fingers along the warm coarse grains, felt the smooth slippery rocks and slimy green algae and smelled the sea. How could the mind build such a realistic environment, when it was nothing but mist and dreams? Yet here she was.

The wind tasted like a promise of conch shells, summer kisses, sea, salt, waves and wonder, and the sound of the water practically purred against the shore, vibrating low and humming to her, tempting.

The water called to her, begged her to come.

Something else called to her too.

A light, soft sound.

Almost like a flute, but not quite. 

Singing. 

Someone was singing. 

She looked to be totally alone and yet the voice pulled to her from every direction.

She was still in Ellsworth and yet it felt warmer than Ellsworth.

What she imagined Sicily or Greece to feel like.

The tow headed blond moved carefully, but there was no Marcus or no Davvie or not even her mother to stop her. In this dream, she could explore and move and allow herself happiness and pleasure.

“I’ll sing you a song of all that’s divine, of precious pure silver and gold of the mind, of rosemary jasmine and jasper stone sweet, of cinnamon oils and Persian retreats. Of finely wove rugs and spices and art, I’ll sing you these things and lure in your heart.”

It was so gentle, so soft, but so powerful.

She’d never heard something so sweet – or so lonely. 

There was something deeply sad beneath the tender vocals, like a forlorn maid begging her love to come back just one more time.

It evoked such a feeling of bittersweet nostalgia.

There wasn’t a real word for it, but the more Cordelia listened, the more she longed to know the secrets behind the song. 

She felt her body moving, almost of it’s own accord and volition, as if it had a mind of it’s own.

Her feet first.

She had no shoes on, and relished in the scratchy feeling of the sand against her flesh.

It surprised her when it went from scratchy to smooth as the foamy creamy waves licked at her toes, ankles and now calves. 

The water welcomed her like a 2nd skin, adoring and adorning her easily. 

The coolness of it was incredible to her, almost like gloss but not sticky at all.   
Clear and bright, even as the sun had sank into the sea, leaving a literal water color of burning reds, pinks, tangerines and golds in its wake.

The more she moved into the water, the more it stained her too, like a rainbow colored ink well overflowing on her hands and night gown.

“We’ve been waiting for this.”

The rocks were coming into view, slow but steady.

It was like she was seeing two dimensions at once, two worlds at once.

She thought they were birds at first, huge birds like the harpy eagle which was one of the largest birds found in the rain forest, but these were far larger than anything she’d seen before. Huge, almost the size of people with six feet wing span at least.

Dusty gray and mottled brown with soft cream underbellies. The silver lunar light splayed over their feathers, making them seem angelic in nature.

This is where the mournful, hypnotic sound was coming from. 

They noticed her now and waved their fingers at her.

Their upper bodies, or part of them anyways, were women like herself but as the moonlight trembled and spilled over them (as if the moon were bleeding pure luxurious silver blue cream into the water and around them, soaking them up) she saw they were indeed related to birds somehow.

It didn’t make a great deal of sense to her, but she followed their call deeper into the water.

“Come join us, sister. Just a little further and all will be well!” They called sensually, playfully. Something in their words reminded her of mermaids, like the books she had read as a child. They weren’t mermaids though, that was silly.

Still, Cordelia had to be near them.

She just had to.

She didn’t fully understand why it was that she found so magical about them, so entrancing.

Had she been thinking clearly she would have most likely been terrified. 

They were stunning from the waist up. Curvy and strong and toned and beautiful with faces so striking they could shatter hearts or enrapture them, depending on the mood with carved out cheeks and large eyes full of colors that went beyond human conception – the deepest azure, ‘Elizabeth Taylor’ lavender and dark brown that reminded Cordelia of freshly crushed almond mixed with gold. 

Full pouting lips, long lashes, perfectly blushed cheeks and tendrils of hair in all textures and colors from the lightest shades of blonde – like freshly sheathed wheat – to the deepest raven. Some of their skin too ranged from starlight blinding white, to smooth cocoa bronze to deepest nightshade. And yet even as their features were not alike genetically there was some untraceable similarity between them that linked them as sisters forever. 

But at some point their bodies shifted into that of a bird. On some of them they had arms, on others they did not, but had talons instead. From their chest wings connected and they became animal. Some of them, if you stared hard enough, carried a glamour over them (like male Sirens did) and if you concentrated the glamour moved: like a glitch in the dream. 

It revealed a horrible frightening beak where their noses and faces should have been. But that was only if one was paying attention, and for Cordelia who was caught up in the Sirens’ spell, she wasn’t seeing that.

The only thing that mattered was getting closer.

The water was up to her chest now and colder than expected.

She was actually shivering, now that she thought about it – 

“Delia!” 

Someone was calling her.

Really calling her. 

“Delia stop!” 

But she couldn’t stop now, could she? Not when she was so close…

For Alex, this was an actual nightmare. He’d woken up to find the window had been opened all the way, and Delia was missing from her bed. He hadn’t meant to fall asleep, he’d been waiting for Jephrem to come take over his shift watching over the blond but something had kept his ‘brother’ from doing that.

Something had gotten in the way.

He wanted to figure it out, but first he had to find Delia. 

And he did find her.

Somehow her mother was in a trance like state, so she couldn’t stop her either.

There the blond was, wading into the water, leaving behind an aquatic frothy ruffle like an inverted bridal train.

“Delia!” He called again, his throat scratchy and hoarse. He had no choice now, no choice to wade into the water with her before it was too late. 

The temperature was frigid.

Her eyes were wide and unseeing.

Or if she was seeing something, it was far beyond human understanding.

She seemed compelled to move forwards, like she was sleep walking.

He had to be very careful then, not to harm her or accidentally cause her to trip and drown.

He began to wade into the water, but a hissing sound stopped him.

The Atargatisans.

Their sleek bodies encircled him like eels, cold and unfeeling and slimy. 

Two of them seemed to swim alongside her as if to escort her into death.

A few others blocked his path now, fangs jutting out of their lips and eyes cruel and blazing.

“Not this time, bird brain.” One of them snarled and swung at him with her tail, which lit up neon green with something deadly. She, like the eels, was electric in some way and her venomous sting would both wound and stop him. 

There were low chirping sounds.

More of them were coming, like fish to a net, and the ones above water were singing the same song the Siren women were singing. 

“It can’t end this way. It just...can’t.” He tried to fight one of them off to get closer to her, reached out a hand to try and shake her awake but they were swarming them. Out of the corner of his eye he saw some of them had come to land in human form, which is how they’d defeated his brothers. 

There simply was too many of them.

His heart broke. 

He felt one of them wrap her tentacle like tail around his leg, trying to sucker him and drag him under, but he rammed her with his arm. 

Somehow Zafar got free and reached out his wings to circle above Delia, and Alex felt his throat clench. There was still time to save her, but it wouldn’t be easy. Both the female sirens and the Atargatisans were working together all too well. 

One of the creatures lashed her tail and gave a cry. 

Jephrem had seemed to free himself as well. One of his wings didn’t look great, he was in pain when he stretched it, but he joined his brother in circling the Atargatisans it was disrupting whatever game plan they had.

Still Delia moved forwards towards the sound that only she seemed to hear.  
Alex couldn’t get to her, even with Jephrem and Zafar causing a distraction: for a battle like this they would have had to have several more male Sirens on their side, and they did not. 

Zafar swept down though, as one of the Atargatisans reached out and grabbed Delia now to try and drag her under and drown her. 

His talons skimmed the top the beast, just missing it.

It was too late…

Her small frail form was under the waves now. 

The bubbles came at first, but then even they hushed.

She was drowning.

The last daughter of Poseidon was drowning. 

“No!” He was heaving, pushing, scraping. He felt them stinging him but he didn’t care. Blindly moving forwards through the pain traveling through his body to try and get to her. He heard them shrieking, he smelt the coppery taste of blood in the air but somehow none of that mattered.

This was not how it was going to end, it just couldn’t be. 

And yet finally the Atargatisans receded when her slim small pale body floated to the surface now unmoving.

They let him come now, when there was nothing left of her but her shell.

They’d completed their mission, in their minds. 

The threat of her taking her father’s seat and taking control of the oceans was over – they had finally done it…

He cradled her soaking wet form and shuttered a sob. 

“Little one, little human. It wasn’t supposed to be this way.” He whispered. His throat felt raw and chapped. He traced her face, the color of bone and tinted blue china, and ran his hands through her strands.

They weren’t supposed to feel grief and yet here, here he felt it shudder through him as if it were a mighty force.

He waded through the water, and placed her carefully on the sands. 

She looked so small, like a sopping wet rag doll lost on a beach excursion. 

How was it possible she still be beautiful in death?

Her lashes were almost auburn blonde, like her mother’s, her tiny lips blue-purple. The marks were fading on her neck where they had held her down.

Blue-black.

He traced them gently, a sadness in his eyes.

He heard the two other male winged ones patting closer, their wet feet slapping on the shoreline.

Wait a moment.

There was nothing but silence now, and yet there was a tiny sound like air being let through a tire.

Where was that coming from?

She was unmoving, as heavy as modeled clay, and yet there was a tiny trace of air somehow.

She was breathing. 

Underneath the bruising where the Atargatisans had drowned her, one had to look extremely carefully, but there were gills. 

“The trauma…” Alex muttered, and Zafar came closer. He was in disbelief. “It’s...it’s triggered the part of the DNA that belongs to Poseidon.”

She was not Siren. She was not Atargatisan. She looked human and yet there was a wildness to her that clearly was not human.

The irony of this was almost laughable. The fools thought they were killing her, they actually were giving her her rightful rebirth.

Was it possible?

He looked again, and the color was returning to her face, a light and delicate flushed rose pink.

“Thank god.” He muttered and slumped against her in shock and disbelief. 

The gills, not needing to be used now, were fading like the bruises. They finished into neat gold-white scars almost like a tattoo on either side of her neck. Like the Atargatisans, funnily enough, he was guessing water would trigger them to open again but she didn’t need them now so they folded into silence.

She lurched against him and coughed violently, her senses coming back to her.

Alex rolled her over slightly so she wouldn’t choke on her own vomit.

Blearily, she saw the men as they were, with wings.

“Am I ...dead?” She coughed again, nothing coming into full vision. One moment she felt she had been dreaming, the next the water rushed her senses and the hands. They were everywhere, shrieking in her ears and pulling her down into nothingness. 

“No, little conch shell. You are far from dead.” Alex muttered, his great dark eyes burning.

“Oh, good.” She whispered, and collapsed into abandon once more. 

All of this was too much for her.

It was too much for him though, as well.

He wasn’t supposed to form attachments but in those moments when he’d watched her dragged under and then floating up to the surface like a discarded piece of trash, his whole heart had lurched. 

She meant something to him now.

It wasn’t just a mission.

His brothers joined him, slow heavy steps in the sand. 

The sun was rising, tearing it’s way through the violet and inky blackness of this would be disaster, it’s golden fingers aggressive against the skyline, burning in shades of blood red and persimmon and white. With it came searing heat.

With it came promise.

He traced her tiny face again, noticed how she curled into him in her slumber.

He’d never let something like this happen to her again, so long as he breathed.

And not just because of Poseidon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Links/Notes for Chapter 13:  
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harpy_eagle  
> music/siren song https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=DHbAbZRPza0&feature=share


End file.
